


Challenge

by Trychtopus



Category: Midnight Poppy Land (Webcomic)
Genre: Multi, One Shot Collection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-01
Updated: 2020-12-01
Packaged: 2021-03-01 23:21:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 38,242
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23945374
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Trychtopus/pseuds/Trychtopus
Summary: The start of a collection of oneshots, drabbles, and ficlets as related to a weekly prompt challenge I've joined.
Relationships: Poppy/Tora
Comments: 98
Kudos: 287





	1. Bathroom Bonding

**Prompt: Character A has had too much to drink at a party, and Character B has (willingly or unwillingly) become their handler.**

Poppy’s forehead slid across the porcelain of the toilet seat as she coughed, her abs aching and her body beginning to tremble as she awaited the next set of dry heaves. The dinner that evening had been a rousing success despite the resulting fallout, and even as she collapsed half into the bowl and spat bile from her lips, she couldn’t help but feel a little giddy. She never would have anticipated being allowed to return for an  exposé given the inferred significance of the location, but Alice had been delighted, enticed by the potential surge in income more than she was deterred by the draw of new, unvetted customers. Poppy had been eager to learn the rich history of such a quaint spot, and Alice, as it turned out, was more than happy to brag.

It had been a long time since she’d partied, however. She’d never been much for going hard in college, preferring instead to remain the steadfast caretaker while her friends lamented their enthusiasm. As she’d brainstormed with Erdene and Jacob over how to do the restaurant justice, Alice had kept the sake flowing, and she was regrettably paying for it now. An acidic twist low in her belly was the only warning she received before her body contorted with the effort to bring up the poison that somehow  _ still  _ plagued her, and as she cursed under her breath when even her most concerted efforts produced nothing but a weak retching, she heard the door to the restroom slide open.

She might have said something if she could stop herself from clutching the toilet and gagging into it, but even as she attempted to turn her head and wave off her intruder, she was startled as a large glass of cool water was gently placed next to her on the floor. Her eyes followed until they lit upon a pair of ostentatious slippers at the ends of stubby, bare legs. An apology made it to her mouth just before the contents of her stomach did. “...H-hey. Sorry this turned into such a-- _ hurk--” _

“Oh, child,” the older woman waved the apology off in a plume of vapor, seemingly unphased by the tiny girl puking her guts out in the miniscule restroom in front of her. “Been there, done that. Got the t-shirt to prove it.” She watched as Poppy finally shuddered and leaned back, forced to stretch her legs out on either side of the toilet as she braced her back against the wall behind her. The old woman tucked her vape between her teeth and took another long drag as she ran a flour sack towel under the faucet, then handed it over. “Here, before ya pass out.”

“Thanks.” She pressed her face into the cloth and savored the way it soothed her until the spins set in anew, forcing her to drop the cloth into her lap while she braced herself against the wall. “‘m not normally like this.”

“You just get all that out your system, little lamb.” She disappeared for a moment and returned with a tabloid magazine and a small wicker chair that she placed just outside the doorway, perching upon it like an old buzzard as she continued puffing away on her saccharine nicotine. It took a few moments of patting her robes absentmindedly before she retrieved her glasses, then opened her magazine to a dog-eared page and turned her gaze to it with interest. “Lord knows ol’ Alice has seen far worse than the likes of a drunk girl who can’t hold her sake.”

Poppy scoffed and smoothed her bangs away from her face, feeling petulant now that the convivial embrace of her earlier buzz had worn off and left her with little more than an acrid taste in her mouth and a strong desire for a bed. She eyed Alice’s slippers as they bounced on the old woman’s feet, wondering if she’d be out of turn to ask her to keep talking, to give her an anchor to cling to while the rest of the world continued to spiral around her. 

It was par for the course, she supposed, to feel as though she were being intrusive by asking for some meaningless interaction now that she had grown used to her newest companion, who was quite arguably the worst conversationalist in history. Even forcing her eyes to remain open did nothing to prevent the image of Tora’s sullen face from swimming to the forefront of her thoughts, a smile curving her lips even as she tried to recall a time when the man  _ wasn’t _ grumpy about one thing or another. He was always so serious, so flighty and defensive… She wondered for a brief moment what he did for fun. Whatever it was, it probably wasn’t...this. “Alice?”

“Yes, dear?” 

“Is Tora okay?”

The old woman remained fixed on the article she’d been reading, her tone dismissive. “That boy’s skull is thicker ‘n ya give it credit for. Ain’t the first time he’s gotten his brains rattled.”

Poppy giggled. “Well, I mean, I know he’s  _ okay _ , but…” Her smile faded as warm memories of their cozy dinner and private smiles dissolved, replaced instead by the thunderous look he’d given her later that evening. Anger came so naturally to him, she mused, and yet even underneath that… He’d looked almost  _ betrayed _ , as if her fruitless encounter with Inspector Lane had been a personal jab at him rather than a routine report. The concept produced a complicated tornado of feelings within her, dropping her somewhere in between irritated and remorseful. She sighed. “I just wonder… if he’s okay.”

There was a heavy pause in the air as old gazed at young; the haze of alcohol that hovered over the small girl like smog did nothing to conceal the pool of heavy emotion underneath. Alice tutted, then lowered her magazine to address the weighted question. "What do  _ you  _ think?"

Poppy hiccupped and winced at the way it turned her stomach. "I think… I think…" She gestured vaguely in front of her, frustrated that what was happening in her heart was apparently impossible to translate from her mouth. "I think that nobody ever stopped to ask him, you know? I mean  _ really  _ ask. I think he spends all this time living this weird shady life for everyone else and none of them have ever stopped to ask him what his favorite color is or his favorite food, or when his stupid birthday is." She scowled and took a deep breath, aware of her rambling but unwilling and unable to stop now that she’d begun.

Alice propped her chin on a gnarled hand and grinned. 

"And I  _ think _ , that if someone would just take the time to look past the fact that he's absolutely terrifying, or that he could probably make a plant wilt just by looking at it--which he can't, by the way, he's looked at mine and they're fine--they might notice that he's actually really sweet, and considerate, and--" she paused, swallowing hard against the inexplicable rush of tears that threatened to spill over, "--and he's so  _ smart _ , Alice. It's like he's three steps ahead of me no matter what we do."

The young brunette stared at the back wall for a moment longer, distantly embarrassed by her candid rant now that the flood gates had opened, but nevertheless relieved by finally having a captive audience who  _ knew  _ the man, somebody she could finally vent to who wouldn’t simply dismiss her concerns as emotional projection or maternal aptitude. She took another deep breath that shuddered in her chest and placed a hand over her eyes to cover the tears that still threatened to tumble from her eyelashes. “What I really think is that he’s a good person who’s stuck in a crap job, and I’m too afraid of him to ask what I can do to help.”

There was a rustling of pages and a long sigh, punctuated by the mechanical hiss of Alice sucking in another hit. Then: “How much do you really know about what he does for a living?”

Poppy considered it for a moment, reluctant to piece together all of the hints she’d gathered over the short time she had known the stoic man. “He...works for some place called the Balthuman Organization.” She dragged her palm down her face and twisted at the rag in her lap as images from her web search teased her memory. “I tried looking them up, but all I could find was stuff about all the charity work that they do.” There was another lengthy pause as she weighed the concept of charity against the way she’d seen his jaw clench and his hands tremble when he was lost in thought. “I think there’s a lot he isn’t telling me, which is fine, but… I mean, have you ever tried  _ asking  _ him anything?”

Alice remained silent as Poppy snorted, waving her hand in irritation. 

“It’s like he’s a closed book, you know? And charity work is all fine and well, but--” she fought valiantly to clamp down on her self-control and promptly lost once again to the alcohol that had flung the gates wide open, “--he introduced himself as a  _ lethal weapon _ . Told me to call him if anything ever happened. What kind of charity organization needs a lethal weapon?” She glanced over at the old woman who still sat a few feet away, watching her diatribe unfold. “It just doesn’t fit. The way he gets lost in thought, it’s like… It’s like he’s seen people  _ murdered _ , you know? And his  _ coworkers _ \--” she swallowed hard and shivered, unwilling to risk even the chance that she might summon them by speaking of them. 

Alice waited until Poppy looked up at her, pretending for a moment that she didn’t notice the glitter of apprehension that lurked at the edges of eyes that were spackled with red now, bruised from the efforts that Poppy’s body put forth to purge itself of the night’s festivities. She knew the raven-haired boy with wild eyes and a caged heart would likely sustain an apoplexy if he knew he was being discussed so openly; the thought privately thrilled her. She’d had her suspicions about this one, the feisty little thing that he’d brought into her bullpen, but this was more than even she could have predicted. Her knees cracked in protest as she stood and stretched, arthritis preventing her from sitting for too long, and offered what she’d hoped was a comforting smile. 

“Child, it ain’t your place to fix the boy.” She watched and chuckled as Poppy looked away from her in response, silent in the face of her long-winded rant but broadcasting her thoughts clear as day regardless. “He isn’t broken. But ya needn’t be scared of ‘im, either.” 

“His hands are bigger than my face, Alice.”

“And he’d no sooner raise one against ya than fly to the moon.” She waddled over to where Poppy still slumped against the wall and flapped her hand, taking the white cloth from her when it was offered in response so she could freshen it with some cold water as she spoke. “Tell me,” she saturated the cloth and then wrung it gently, handing it back as she leaned against the sink, “why let him back in, if you’re so sure he’s dangerous?”

Poppy frowned and held the wet fabric in her hands for a moment, then draped the entire thing over her face with a dramatic sigh. “Aside from the fact that he follows me like a shadow no matter  _ what  _ I do?” Silence answered her, so she continued, feeling defeated by the way her body still felt like it was spinning despite her thoughts having cleared long ago. “I guess… he just makes me feel like I have a place here, you know? Like I’m not just a little fish in a big pond. There’s a thousand other women in this city more beautiful than I am, more… qualified. He could take his pick of anyone. But he keeps picking me.”

“And why do you think that is?”

Poppy barked out a laugh and wiggled her fingers in front of her. “ _ Huge balls. _ ”

“...”

“...sorry. He’s kind of bad at compliments.” She pulled the cloth from her face and looked up at the old woman who was frowning at her response, her disapproval nearly tangible in the claustrophobic room. She dropped her eyes in apology and shook her head. “I don’t know. Honestly. I’m nobody. I’m not very fast, or strong, or useful. I hardly know anybody here. I don’t have a lot of money. And all I seem to do when he’s around is stress him out.” She rubbed at a stain in the grout between the floor tiles, trying not to think of how many times he’d had to clean up a mess she’d made for them both. “I guess, maybe, it’s because he can just be himself when he’s around me...whoever that is. I might not know much about him, but I feel like there probably aren’t a lot of people in the world who know that he has dimples, either. I guess that’s gotta mean something.”

To her surprise, Alice answered her brooding with a chuckle. “From where I stand, little lamb, you know more about that man than he does.” She snapped her fingers twice to get Poppy’s attention, then gestured toward her, encouraging her up and off the floor. “Come on now, that’s enough feeling sorry for yourself. This ain’t no hotel. That’s right, shake it off.” She watched as the girl before her rose on wobbly legs and pawed at an eye, then embraced her with two steadying hands on Poppy’s arms. 

Once confident that the young girl could stand on her own, the old woman let go of her and turned to retrieve her chair, placing it back outside the door. She could hear Poppy flush the toilet before following after her and was pleased to note that she’d brought the now-empty glass with her, maintaining her good manners even as she continued to sway dangerously where she stood. The water would be a small drop in the bucket she’d need in the morning, but it had been enough to distract her while the old woman got the information she’d been looking for. Turning her head to hide the devilish grin that crept to her face, she slid her phone from her robes and sent a quick text, then watched as Poppy began reaching for her purse.

“I guess I ought to call a cab. Cabs  _ do  _ come out here, right?” She frowned for a moment and dug in the side pocket of the leather satchel, clumsy from exhaustion as her hangover began to take hold.

“No need. Ya ride’s already on his way, darlin’.”

“Oh my g--Tora--you  _ called  _ him?”

“Nobody knows these streets like he does, toots. Hell of a lot cheaper, too, if ya ask me.” She stifled a chuckle at the sheer panic that had overtaken the sullen girl from moments ago, affirming her decision. “Why don’t ya take the time to ask him all those questions ya wanted to know?”

“He’s gonna  _ kill me _ .”

“He’ll do no such thing. Now, go tidy up before he sees ya lookin’ like a trainwreck.” She weathered Poppy’s long, suffering look before the girl finally surrendered, disappearing back into the restroom to follow instructions. Once the door shut, Alice finally allowed herself an indulgent giggle and glanced back down at her phone:

_ Come get ya little lamb. You owe me. _

She paused, feeling particularly plucky now that all of the pieces were finally falling into place, and tacked on a second message.

_ And tell her ya damn birthday. _


	2. Rescue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Headcanon Prompt: How did Tora meet Alice?

The haze over Narin City was particularly heavy that night, lurking overhead like an acrid, sour veil. He moved swiftly, careful to make as little noise as possible, darting through the shadows as if to become one, himself. He could taste the smog on the back of his tongue as he steadied his breath, desperate to find balance between his labored breathing and his noise discipline. A cramp began to twist like a coiled serpent low in his belly, though from hunger or from exertion, it was impossible for him to say. He took a moment to dip into a small alcove and crouched behind a dumpster there, taking a moment to clutch protectively at his midsection, and ground his teeth together as anger began to bloom.

The air that evening was crisp with the promise of an early winter and an even more immediate rainfall, enveloping him in an algid embrace as it chilled the sweat that coated his body. He knelt, cursing under his breath and rubbing violently at his arms to stave off the fruitless shivers that wracked his body. His shirt clung to him beneath the tattered hoodie he’d donned, saturated with grime and perspiration that he was never quite able to scrub clean, doing little to insulate him against the relentless gusts that coarsed along the alleyways like a rip current. He curled in on himself, trembling and furious. 

It was nearly impossible to stop the wave of self-pity that washed over him, propelled by the aching hunger in his gut and the soreness of wounds that never seemed to be allowed to heal before new ones were introduced. He knew it was useless; he understood more than anyone else that this sort of thinking would do nothing to put food in his belly or keep him warm for the night, but as his back pressed against the damp brick behind him and his legs finally gave out, he found himself powerless against the rotting ache that swelled within his throat, threatening what little composure he struggled to maintain as he tried in vain to swallow it back down.

It was certainly far from the first time he’d been exiled to the streets to fend for himself. For years now, he’d battled with the unforgiving ubiquity of a city that neither noticed nor cared about him. He’d admit, if only to himself, that there had been several times he’d really earned it, too--losing his temper seemed to be an inalienable skill no matter how many times he found himself regretting it after the fact. He’d taken those lumps as best he could manage, knowing full well the punishment had been justified. This was not one of those times, however, and he reached up to scrub at his eyes with filthy hands, unable to stop the tears that dripped like warm betrayal onto his cheeks.

He’d tried this time; he really had. He’d stayed up late even after his training for the young master, ignorant of the hours that seemed to blend together until his eyes burned, and he’d even been careful to keep his nose from bleeding onto the paper as he’d practiced his lessons over and over. He was diligent to remember all of the things he’d been told so many times--keep your writing legible, make sure the words are spelled correctly, pay attention to the beginning, middle, and end--but it hadn’t worked. He’d poured as much effort as he could into the assignment, but the words just wouldn’t  _ work _ like he needed them to, and when Mr. Balthuman had seen the low marks he’d received in return, it was another night in the cold, no questions asked.

He slammed a fist into the side of the dumpster next to him and sighed, frustrated. Beyond the nook, rain began to fall in thunderous sheets.

Quincey didn’t struggle like this, he knew. He’d even tried to help him a handful of times when the boss wasn’t looking, making as many corrections as he could find when he was able to make sense of whatever Tora had managed to get down on paper. He could remember trying so many times to explain to others that his brain just didn’t work like they needed it to, that things didn’t make sense the way they were explained, but it was to no avail. The clan members viewed it as insolence, as some sort of bizarre defiance in the face of their lessons, and they’d answered him by beating the words into him when speaking them had failed. 

His teachers fared no better, though he knew not to fear them the same way he awaited the cold glares and glinting steel that often welcomed him home after class. They never resorted to violence, of course, but instead looked upon him with pity, neither willing nor able to see past the emblem branded onto his neck like a war flag. There had been one poor soul once, he could recall, who had noticed the black eyes and the stitches and the cigarette burns, who had listened to his awkward descriptions of how his mind mixed up letters and how his hand hurt too much to hold the pen properly. They’d tried to help him, and the clan had returned the favor in kind, making it known in no small terms how they’d felt about his tutoring taking away from his secondary education.

He'd stopped asking for help after that.

His teacher had never been seen again, and word had spread quickly of the fate that befell any who interfered with the young man who sported the Balthuman crest. He learned quickly how to game the system from then on, finding it much easier to simply bribe his homework from those who could take advantage of his more unique skill set. There were many who were more than happy to trade their intelligence for protection against others like him, and Tora soon discovered that his bruised knuckles and bad attitude were noticed far less often than his shitty book reports. As it turned out, the crest largely protected him from ire as much as it prevented him from thriving, and so he found no reason not to take advantage of the fact that he wouldn’t be punished for cheating his way through.

Best not to waste time on  _ him _ , when there were future scholars to be made.

And so he sat, in what he was pretty sure at this point was an actual puddle, starving and cold and angry and trapped, and he glared at the wall in front of him and wondered why he had to be here miserable when that blond pussy with his big brain and weak hands was asleep in his enormous warm bed, for having done half the work at a quarter of the effort. He was just as good at everything else, if not better, so why did one measly subject matter so much? Why did he deserve this when he’d done everything that they’d asked of him? 

He let his eyes fall closed in defeat, wavering between broken apathy and righteous indignation. He couldn’t run; he certainly knew that much. He’d tried once before and barely survived the ordeal when they’d caught him, the memories of  _ that  _ particular pain still a little too fresh in spite of the years that had since passed. Even so, the temptation was impossible to snuff completely when he was faced with...this. Kids talked at school--particularly because he really didn’t--and he heard a lot more than they gave him credit for. He knew that other boys his age were into sports and girls and vacations, so why was he stuck doing this? Why did he have to learn how to hurt people when he could be learning how to be normal instead?

He opened his eyes and stared ahead without focus, too emotionally drained to make sense of it all.

Mr. Balthuman had always been very direct with him in letting him know how privileged he was. As far back as he could remember, he’d been told over and over again that he was part of an esteemed group, a business, a model, a  _ family _ . He’d been  _ chosen _ . He was being trained for one of the most important jobs a member could get, no expense spared. On the good days, Tora could almost believe it. On the good days, he ate well, and he slept in a dry place, and he was told that he’d made them proud. When he’d been younger, he’d thirsted for that praise, had worked hard for it and basked in the warm glow of being celebrated for his skills.

Now he was beginning to wonder just how much of it was complete bullshit.

The older he got, the harder the family was to impress. He rarely complained, at least out loud. He worked hard, he fought harder, and yet more and more often it seemed as though he was cast out for offenses that were getting to be so minor he could hardly predict them anymore. The more he learned to fend for himself, the more it seemed he was forced to do so. There was no lesson to be learned here. There was nothing he could fix. It wasn't fair, and he didn't really care  _ how  _ childish it sounded to say so. His tears had dried several minutes ago, leaving him slumped against the wall in a pathetic heap as he nursed the bitterness in his heart.

He wasn’t sure how much time passed while he lingered there, lacking even the energy to seek out a hot meal for himself. It mattered little to him, so long as he was back in enough time to run some water through his hair and get changed for school, lest he be reprimanded for looking unkempt...again. The snort that escaped him was flat, lacking the typical sarcasm he found so easily came to him when faced with the likelihood of being put out for something so stupid. His eyes drooped and his head rolled to rest against the dumpster he’d punched earlier, soothed minutely by the cool metal that cradled him as a steel pillow. 

Tora had just nearly fallen asleep when a door was kicked open a scarce few feet to his left, quite effectively separating his soul from his physical form. He was on his heels before his thoughts caught up to him, fists balled and ready as he crouched, his body fraught with tension as he eyed the hulking figure that appeared in the doorway. Whoever it was hadn’t noticed him yet, too busy yelling over their shoulder at someone else inside, and he very quickly weighed his options to leave unnoticed or to hide. On the one hand, he cared little for small talk and even less for needless confrontation, and it didn’t take a genius to anticipate that whoever this person was, he likely wouldn’t appreciate some random grungy kid sleeping behind his property. 

On the other hand... he was so tired, and this spot was mostly dry, and all he really wanted was to be left alone to wallow and rest. He meant no harm or intrusion, and that had to matter for something, right? Hadn’t he been polite? Hadn’t he behaved himself? Hadn’t he followed all the rules they’d taught him about not getting caught or causing a scene? He watched, frozen in place, as the man emerged with an irritated wave of his hand, tossing a bag full of trash in a graceful arc straight over Tora’s head into the dumpster, then retreated inside without comment.

He blinked, uncertain.

His body had not yet relaxed when the door burst open once more, this time to reveal a much smaller figure who leaned out and squinted at him from behind thick glasses. She appraised him without fanfare, giving him an obvious once-over as she sucked in a long drag from the cigarette that bobbed comically between pursed lips. He was again faced with the lingering decision to bolt or to square up when she made the decision for him, barking at him with a voice that sounded as though it were made from gravel. 

“Well? Ya just gonna lurk out there or what? Get in here and get yer belly full.”

The door slammed behind her, leaving only the sound of the rain crashing down behind him.

Tora stood motionless for a long moment, wary of the command. In his experience, nothing ever came without a price, and a high one at that--he’d been forced to earn every morsel he’d ever gotten from the clan, and twice so from the city at large. Those costs had been obvious up front, however, whether a sparring match, a target, or a long night alone in a concrete warzone. This was something he’d had yet to encounter, and he didn’t trust it, no matter how badly he wanted it to be real. He frowned, straightening out of his combat crouch, and turned to leave for more peaceful pastures when he heard the old woman’s voice call out a second time:

“Ain’t gonna tell ya twice, kid,” there was a soft sound that followed, as if something being slid across a hard surface, and then her voice warbled out much quieter than when she’d first exploded: “nobody’s dyin’ on my conscience tonight.”

He turned and glanced over his shoulder to see that the woman had vanished, and in her place, she’d left a styrofoam plate laden with takoyaki and a bottle of water. His mouth watered instantly even as his eyes darted back to the door, and he quickly found his thoughts tumbling chaotically between staying and leaving until his body intervened, carrying him toward the food without conscious resolution. His stomach growled and he slumped onto the ground next to the stairs where the meal sat waiting for him, digging in without ever bothering to tear the disposable chopsticks from their wrapper.

Tora made it halfway through the food, and all the way through the bottle of water, before he felt two sets of eyes at his back. He froze, turning his head in a methodical scan, eyeballing his escape route and calculating which moves he’d need in such a tight space, until he met the gaze of the first gentleman who’d nearly brained him with the trash. His face was gentle as he spoke to him, lips curved in a half smile.

“How’s it taste?”

He stared, chewing absentmindedly, waiting for the other shoe to drop. The older woman tutted, then elbowed the young man, waving him off.

“Look, ya damn near frightened the boy to death. Get back in the kitchen before he tries to run off again. Go on!” She stared after the man as he vanished further into the room behind her, then turned her gaze on Tora once more. “Eat. Plenty more where that came from, which you’ll be needin, by the looks of ya.” 

He took another bite, more confused than anything, as she tightened the apron that draped over her doudy body and then dusted her hands on it. Moments later, she stepped out onto the small stoop, allowing the door to close behind her. He watched in stupefied fascination as she groaned into a sitting position on the step where she’d placed his food, fished out a cigarette, and lit it with a long, satisfied sigh. 

“Spend a lot of your time sleeping next to dumpsters, do ya?” 

He finally swallowed and found his voice, still eyeing the woman warily. “N-no, ma’am.”

“Oh, you do talk.” She took another drag and coughed, wet and raspy, before waving his answer off as if it were a pest buzzing in the air. “Well, I meant what I said. Ya look like ya skin and bones, kid. There’s good work to be had here if you’re interested. How old are you?”

He frowned. “I--” The question gave him pause. He hadn’t had a birthday party in years. “I’m...not sure.”

“Well, what grade?” 

He counted for a moment, wondering if it was relevant that they’d tried to hold him back a year before Mr. Balthuman had changed their minds. “Eighth grade.”

“Hm, too young to hire on properly then,” she murmured the words to herself, and yet they cut through Tora like a hot knife. It had been very difficult, as he sat there and ate better than he’d eaten in weeks, not to feel some sort of optimism from this strange woman and her weird glasses and the smile that hid a mouth missing more teeth than her age should have allowed. She smacked her lips and planted her hands against her thighs, knocking her cigarette ash into her lap. “Still need another set of strong hands around here, though. These old bones ain’t what they used to be.  _ Joseph!” _

Tora jumped as she screamed the name, suppressing a grin at the annoyed response that squawked from the kitchen. “Ma!”

“Bring another plate out already! Stars and garters, have I taught ya  _ nothin’--” _

There was a bit of noise from inside before a large, meaty hand shoved another hastily-prepared plate out the door. The old woman eyeballed him until he accepted it, then nodded to herself, pleased.

Tora stared down at his plate, his midsection still aching and his thoughts racing, and sighed. “Ma’am, I--”

“--will work for every bite of food you eat, young man.” 

He peered up at her.

“Can’t put ya on the payroll til ya old enough, but I’m more ‘n happy to compensate ya with a few hot meals and some shelter til you get ya head right.” She re-lit the cigarette that had gone out several minutes ago and sucked the last hit off of it, then stamped it out under her foot. “There’ll be no smokin’, no cussin’, and no fightin’ in my restaurant. It’s grueling work, but it’s clean.”

He would have laughed if he’d had the energy. “I don’t...understand.” She narrowed sharp blue eyes at his response, and he bit back the suspicion that sat awkwardly in his mouth. “This is...why? Why me?”

“I need the help, and you need the job. Or has old Master Balthuman relaxed his standards lately?”

Tora flinched, nearly dropping the food in his lap.

“Ah, child, ol’ Alice has been around far longer than you been a thought. That crest on ya neck may as well be a neon sign lit up.” She reached out and smoothed at the thick mop that crowned his head, forcing the hair on the back of his neck to stand on end. “Tsk, just like a stray cat. Ya ain’t the first boy to show up back here shiverin’ and scared, you know.”

“I’m  _ not-- _ ”

“The hell you’re not scared.” The maternal hand that had continued preening him punctuated her statement with a sharp smack, cutting his protest short. “You’d be stupid not to be. And I know you don’t say much, but I can tell ya ain’t stupid.”

She was the first person who had ever said as much, and he ruminated on the statement as he worked through his second helping. It was true; Mr. Balthuman had been on his case about finding a job for a few months now, something about maintaining a “clean image” and working for what he got. It hadn’t made any sense, and it still didn’t, considering how hard he  _ already  _ worked for the clan, but fighting against the Balthuman family was as effective as cheating death. In the end, the family always won, and Tora needed no further reminders of  _ that  _ lesson. He swallowed the bite in his mouth and considered his words carefully. “I...have a lot of work that I already do for the family.”

“I’m sure ya do.” He kept his eyes steady on his plate even as he felt hers rake over him, no doubt the same way his teachers had done countless times when he’d shown up to class with new wounds overlapping the old. Her tone lacked the familiar dejection, however, and he found her matter-of-fact appraisal of him to be oddly comforting. “You show up as often as you’re able until ya learn the ropes. Joseph will teach ya what you need to know up front. Prove yourself reliable, and there’s a room with ya name on it upstairs ‘til you can afford ya own.” She stood and patted the debris from her pants. “What I ask in return is some heavy lifting here and there, some prep work, and bus work. Clean up the tables and treat the customers with respect.” 

“And if I don’t come back?”

She chuckled. “Well, I guess that’s up to you. Got no control over ya if I never see ya again, hmm?”

He mulled it over, then crammed the last of the food into his mouth and wiped his hands onto his pants. It took him a moment to remember not to speak with his mouth full, and he was grateful that she waited for him despite the awkward silence that stretched out as he chewed. “I’ll think about it.”

“Suppose that’s as good as can be expected. What’s ya name?”

He frowned up at her. The clan had warned him not to give his name out to many people until he was confident he could defend it. The kindness this woman had shown him this evening was still suspicious, still unwarranted and unearned, but she had a genuine light behind the thick glasses that glinted against the glow from the kitchen, and he supposed it couldn’t possibly hurt him any worse than the punishment to which he’d already been subjected. Her frame was slight and it was difficult to miss the arthritis that had already begun twisting her joints. If this were a trap, it would be a very strange one, and he was so tired of being beaten down he wasn’t entirely sure he had it in him to refuse her regardless. “Tora.”

“Tora, hm? Wait here.” She vanished into the building, the entrance leading to what he could now see was the kitchen she’d sent Joseph into. She was gone long enough that he was beginning to reconsider until there was a minor commotion from the inside, quieting right before she reappeared holding out a large, thick coat. “Ya can’t stay inside tonight, not til I know you won’t rob the joint blind. But this ought to help ya stay warmer than the rags ya got on.” 

Tora stared stupidly at the coat being handed to him until Alice shook it impatiently, insistent.

“It’s Joseph’s old winter jacket. Probably huge on ya now, but you’ll grow into it in due time,” she patted her apron absentmindedly for her cigarettes, “winter’s on its way and ya look half frozen to death as it is. Best hold onto that til we get some meat on those scrawny bones of yours.”

If Tora had been uncomfortable before, the attention she was doting upon him now was outright alien. He shifted anxiously on his feet, unsure of how to exit the situation without coming off as rude. “Th-thank you?”

“Tch! Even the manners need work. I swear I don’t know what that man builds his empire on if nothing but feral children.” She paused and noted the way he turned from her, his cheeks pink with shame, and flapped some dirt off of his sweatshirt dismissively. “No matter, child, ain’t nothin' that can’t be learned in this world. Just gotta find ya language is all.” 

He blinked, turning the words over in his mind. It was the second time that evening that she’d offered him an inexplicable vote of confidence, and it was very quickly spiraling into territory that was not in his wheelhouse to address. Before he could respond, she’d snagged his chin between bony fingers and turned his face back to hers, a warm smile in place as he stuttered and attempted to pull away. She allowed him to struggle for a moment, then let go with a chuckle. 

“Ain’t no one to bother ya that comes through here if you stick around. Best throw that coat on so ya don’t catch ya death out here. Seen too many boys your age get snuffed out early and I won’t be having it anymore. Not if I can help it.” She turned from him then, opening the door with much less animation than when she’d startled him half to hell earlier that evening, but paused before she left him. “If they ask ya where you been, you tell ‘em ol’ Alice took ya on. They’ll know me.”

For the first time that evening, Tora found it within himself to try smiling. It felt foreign on his face, but it seemed to satisfy the old woman who had offered him a small bit of kindness that evening. He bowed his head graciously.

“Thanks, Alice.”

“ _ Miss _ Alice to you, child.”

His smile broadened into a playful smirk, and as he lifted his eyes to hers, he found that she matched it, herself. “Thanks,  _ Miss  _ Alice.” She left him then, and locked the door behind her.

Tora tidied the two plates he’d been served that evening and tossed them into the dumpster before settling back down next to it, careful to avoid the puddle this time. The coat she’d given him smelled of mothballs and cedar, and he pulled it tight to his chin as he draped it over himself as a blanket. The rain had slowed by now, falling in a gentle drizzle and he watched the water run along the street in hurried rivulets, oddly at peace. The ache in his gut had been soothed now, and his eyes grew heavy in the wake of his satiated hunger. He leaned his head against the metal as he’d done earlier and sighed deeply, pulling his knees to his chest so they could enjoy the dry warmth of his new gift.

Tora didn’t believe in karma, or God, or whatever new age bullshit people tried to use to justify their decisions these days. It was enough for him to simply be grateful, whether this turned out to be a trap or not, to have been given a warm, dry night with a full belly and the promise of something more than he’d arrived with. The mystery of it all was daunting to him; he didn't know this Joseph and he didn’t know what he’d be taught, but he figured that maybe somebody like Alice with her strange generosity and aggressive affection could find a way to show him what no one else had yet. 

It was with a lighter heart and a rare smile that he fell to slumber that evening, soothed by the lullabye of a city that had finally made a space for him.


	3. Unalloyed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: A kiss inspired by the movie, "The Notebook".

Someone had told him once, that when your back was  _ really  _ against the wall, life slowed down.

He’d scoffed at them, of course, full of teenage piss and vinegar and nursing a black eye that swelled aggressively overtop the previous one that hadn’t yet been allowed to heal. The memory of that particular lecture, among all the others, was still clear as day, and though he’d lacked the insight at the time to digest the real meaning behind the words, he was finding that now, of all times, was when it truly hit him in its entirety. He never would have thought so, even now, but it seemed as though the man who had imparted such wisdom upon him had been speaking  _ literally _ , and he could feel his stomach growing heavier with dread as the seconds ticked by with brutal lethargy.

The evening had started off innocently enough despite his passionate insistence that it shouldn’t have happened at all. It had been Quincey’s red-carpet debut as the mysterious and renowned best seller behind the Secret Garden series, with his beautiful young editor dutifully at his side. With the brewing clan war gaining a frightening amount of momentum as days passed, Tora had pulled every trick he could think of to convince the young mafia lord to reconsider not just a public appearance, but an _advertised_ one at that, but it was to no avail. The allure of finally being recognized properly for his efforts, and of celebrating Poppy in a couture dress, to boot, had been too strong, and so Tora had found himself chauffeuring both of them to an event he was quite certain would increase the threats against all _three_ of their lives by several orders of magnitude.

His heart thundered painfully in his chest, the pressure on his left side whispering sinister hints to him that he was likely a great deal more injured than he’d first anticipated through the rush of adrenaline. His eyes darted around the lobby, scanning frantically for any sign, any  _ minute  _ flash of brown hair or the dress she’d worn or any indicator at all that Poppy was even still alive, but it was to no avail—she was gone. Quincey had been secured easily enough, having practiced again and again his routes of egress and reliance on Tora’s expertise, but Poppy had not gone through the clan training as they had; she’d reacted as any other unvetted civilian would have, and she’d run. Now she was nowhere to be seen, and he had no way of verifying her safety.

He swallowed the lump in his throat and told himself it was just from the broken ribs he’d earned that evening, despite his heart screaming otherwise.

She’d been something to behold when he had gone to pick her up. With Quincey wanting to preen the entire way there, he’d asked Tora to go upstairs and retrieve her, caring little for the shoddy apartment building or the security guard who was inexplicably unbothered by the two ostentatious gentlemen abruptly showing up at the gate. She’d called for him as he’d knocked on the door, telling him that it was left open for him, to come on in and give her a hand if he could…

Even in the midst of the chaos in which he currently found himself immersed, it was impossible to keep his mouth from going dry at the memory of her when he’d followed her instructions, and as his feet began to move toward the back of the convention center, he was wholly distracted by it yet again, offering him a private, perfect distraction from the blood that seeped from his body or the heart that warbled, broken with dread, behind the Kevlar vest he’d worn that evening.

He had walked into her little apartment sporting little more than a foul mood and a tuxedo, wholly prepared to have to motivate  _ her  _ to move her ass, as well, but the picture of her when he’d finally found her had stripped him of all but barely-contained awe. She’d been reluctant to accept the invitation at all initially, embarrassed to admit that she had nothing to wear and did  _ not  _ belong in the public spotlight, which had only spurred Quincey to double down on his persistence and the man had spared no expense. She’d glanced at Tora over her shoulder, a bashful blush dusting her cheeks even underneath the makeup she’d had done earlier that day, and asked him in a hushed voice if he might help her with her zipper.

He could remember, even now as his body moved mechanically through the back hallways unseen and unheard, how it had been one of the most difficult tasks of his entire life to simply do as he was asked in that moment. The dress that the blonde had chosen for her was exquisite, of course, but simple—the elegant lines and sparse jewels that decorated the gown were ideal for accentuating the feminine curves of her body, and the daring plunge of her neckline took second place only to the one at her back, as the zipper pull sat waiting for his capable hands just above her tailbone. His hands had begun to shake with the effort it took not to tear the dress from her body, to throw her onto the mattress and ruin her coiffed hair and perfect makeup, to reveal the rest of the pale flesh that contrasted with near-painful beauty against the deep, royal blue of the fabric encasing it…

_ And where is she now, asshole? _

He clenched his jaw, able to hear the distant police sirens screaming in their approach.

_ What good was all that if she’s fuckin’ dead? The hell kind of body guard  _ are  _ you? _

He slipped out the back door, increasingly able to count the wounds on his body and growing nauseous from the cortisol dump that flooded his veins. It had been a horrific display of just how correct he’d been in his assumptions that the evening would go tits-up, as Ninedaggers had jumped on the opportunity to assassinate the heir to the Balthuman clan. Although they’d been fortunate that the members the opposing gang had sent were sloppy in their work, undoubtedly new and expendable members who’d erred as much from inexperience as they had from nerves, it had still boiled down to an utter shitshow. When the first shots had rung out, missing Quincey by inches, he’d grabbed the blonde by his belt mid-speech and hurled him backstage, reacting before he’d ever even known he’d been moving.

Fortunately, the men he’d scattered undercover throughout the event had performed expertly, moving quickly to neutralize the threat while Tora worked on evacuating a hysterical best-selling author into the backseat of a getaway vehicle. When he’d returned, the mayhem of it all had nearly died down entirely, and as his henchmen worked on body retrieval and interrogation plans, he had begun his search for the one person he’d ever cherished, who was nowhere to be found. He’d located her purse, which had dropped unceremoniously to the floor as she’d bolted, now clutched in a white-knuckle grip at his side. It contained nothing more than a tube of lipstick, her apartment keys, her ID, and her phone, but it was enough to intensify the dread that coursed through his veins tenfold. With no way of getting a hold of her, and no way of her proving who she was to any other help that might appear for her, they were both stranded—and he’d rather be shot  _ again  _ than to entertain that a second longer.

Finally exiting out of the loading dock, he braced his back against the wall there and lit a cigarette with shaking hands, listening to the chorus of emergency sirens drawing ever closer. If he hung around too long, he’d be subjected to their questioning no doubt, likely at least detained… but his mind was on another planet at this point, rife with images of all the various things that could have happened to his little hamster. Death, he supposed, would have been the  _ most  _ merciful, as Ninedaggers was known for taking hostages and executing bribes against their enemies. If they had managed to capture her, knowing that she was associated with the second-in-line to the clan… He suppressed a shudder, clamping down on  _ that  _ particular train of thought before it could go any further.

The pain in his chest doubled as he took a long drag on his cigarette, wondering if he was going to find the motivation to leave, after all. Poppy was clever, he knew, and unusually resourceful, but was she quick enough to escape even the most amateur members of the mafia? Did the risk of sticking around for clues outweigh the dangers of anyone still lurking, or worse, the wrath of Balthuman when he was briefed on why he stayed? He glanced down at the tiny jeweled clutch in his hand, smoothing a thumb across the sequins that glittered on the surface.

Was it even worth it, he mused, to go on knowing that there was a chance he’d never get to see her again?

It was never supposed to get this far, to be sure. If he’d just followed the rules, his  _ own  _ rules, life would be simpler and the lines would still be clear. He’d known he was playing with fire when he’d allowed himself the indulgence of seeing her that day Ronzo had guilted him into doing what he did best, but the allure of a life separate from his own was too strong, too powerful for even him to resist, and now what? He’d burned them both. The anger and fear that had driven him to survive the event had now dissolved quite neatly into an overwhelming blanket of shameful remorse, punctuated by the reminder that despite his best intentions, everything he touched seemed to crumble into fragments of disaster.

A heavy rain began to fall, crashing down in a violent sheet as if to compliment the storm that raged within him. The humidity in the air was suffocating, demonstrating the notorious reputation of Narin City for its near-tropical summers, and he watched absentmindedly as the torrents of water pounded down upon the asphalt. The weather did little to inspire him to move, as the only thing he desired less than being injured and stranded was to be injured, stranded, and soaking wet in a ruined tuxedo. He flicked his cigarette butt over the edge of the loading dock and shifted with a grunt, slipping the jacket from his shoulders to finally inspect the damage that had been done to his body in the fray. Unsurprisingly, he noted that blood had oozed through the shirt in more than one location, though the wounds themselves were largely superficial. He ripped the bowtie from around his neck and undid the collar, shoving the slip of black fabric into his pocket for now.

The sun had just started to dip on the horizon, though the hour was later than he might have initially suspected by the daylight available. The rainfall had allowed the smell of the dumpsters and grease traps to blossom into an acrid perfume that lingered through the air even in spite of the rainfall, and he spat, clearing the taste of it from his mouth in a frothy, pink mess upon the cement. His head was pounding, his ribs ached, and it was becoming harder to breathe, but still he found himself anchored to the wall where he leaned and watched the flashes of red and blue illuminate the isolated cargo area before him.

It wasn’t until he could hear the skittering of a metal can that his body tensed immediately, betraying his earlier commitment to defeat. He tensed, straining to listen past the roar of rainfall to pinpoint where the noise had originated, finding little else but the steady drumbeat of his own heart pounding in his ears. He moved away from the wall, wanting as much room to maneuver as possible if he had to fight again, subtly dreading the undoubted aggravation to his injuries but not quite willing to sacrifice himself just yet, then whipped his head toward another sound, equally as small, as if something soft and heavy were dropped against…

He squinted. Someone was behind the dumpsters.

His hands clenched as his mind calculated, lightning quick and lethal in his preparations to dispatch whoever had the unfortunate audacity to share this space with him. The dress shoes he’d donned did little to aid him in a close-quarters fight, but he’d done much more with a lot less in the past, and the cover of a summer storm might actually work to his advantage by offering a healthy amount of noise discipline. Just as he began to bend down to set his jacket and Poppy’s purse to the side, he blinked, catching sight of a pale shoulder and a flash of royal blue as it passed across the gap between the enormous trash receptacles.

Where he’d been prepared for battle seconds prior, he found his heart in his throat once more as he stood still as a boulder, nearly in pain from the effort he was putting into trying to see  _ through  _ the dumpsters, to catch another glimpse of the impossible, of what simply couldn’t be… He watched with crippling tunnel vision as a young lady stumbled forward, panting and soaked, to brace herself against the filthy, rusted metal next to her. Her hair had fallen victim to the torrential downpour, sticking to her face and neck in slick, chestnut tendrils; her dress, once a show-stopping display of silk and elegance, was thoroughly ruined. Her feet were bare and her makeup ran along her cheeks in rivulets of blacks and greys, accentuating the grime that covered what parts of her body weren’t protected by saturated Parisian design.

It was Poppy.

Going against everything he’d ever been taught, Tora called out to her, high from the dizzying rush of relief that rippled through his body at the sight of her alive and conscious. “ _ Oi!” _

A scream erupted from her as she darted back into her hiding place. He watched as she peeked out through the gap between the dumpsters.

“Bobby?!”

“T-Tora!?”

To hear her voice calling out to him after all the events of the evening… Even shrill with terror, it was a symphony. He jumped down off of the loading dock and immediately felt his body tense painfully against the chill of the rain that still poured relentlessly down upon him, his injuries aggravated by the secondary adrenaline rush and impact of declining to use the steps that he now saw a few feet from where he’d leapt. Poppy rounded the corner from her hiding spot, and even in the rapidly diminishing light of dusk, Tora could see with terrible clarity as her eyes filled with tears when she finally realized that it was he who was standing there calling for her. She appeared to be largely uninjured, though he’d still insist that she be seen by one of their doctors to be certain, and that would be after  _ he’d  _ given her a thorough once-over, himself—

“Tora!”

He blinked, water dripping from his eyelashes and his hair plastered against his forehead, and his breath left him as she sprinted toward him. Her dress clung to her body, undoubtedly heavy and awkward around her ankles as she closed the distance between them, her arms reaching out toward him in frightened desperation. Her feet caught the hem of the gown just as she neared him and she stumbled, crying out, prompting him to catch her as she tumbled forward into his arms. The heat of her skin slammed into his body through the soaked linen of his dress shirt as he hoisted her against himself, crushing her into his chest as relief settled within his gut like cinder blocks. Supporting her with his uninjured side, he turned his face to meet hers, only to find himself pulled into a kiss that left him more breathless than the bullet that had slammed into him earlier that evening.

Poppy clung to him, smoothing his bangs away from his eyes as their lips met in a clash, neither aware of anything other than the way it felt to be there, in that moment, secured in the arms of the only other person who made them feel whole. Tora tasted her hungrily, drinking from her body between the rain and the warm, salted tears that still poured from her eyes, comforted by the flutter of her heartbeat against his chest as he tried desperately to pull her closer still. Sobs wracked her body as she kissed him, no longer burdened by the crippling shyness or coy, girlish flirting she’d exhibited in all their prior meetings—this was raw, and as she smoothed her fingertips along his cheeks, his brow, his jawline and sucked in a deep breath to steady herself before stealing his mouth with her own once more, he found that in that moment his soul starved for her more fervently than his body could ever hope to achieve.

When they finally separated, Poppy gazed down at him, still fearful despite the security of Tora’s arm around her body. Her hands still cradled his face as if he were a precious artifact, and as she spoke, neither of them was bothered by the storm that lashed them or the increasing proximity of stampeding footsteps that approached from inside. The sobs that had plagued her had quieted to arrhythmic hiccups as she tried desperately to force her words to come out.

“Tora, I—I thought you were—I couldn’t find—”

“Shh, sweetheart, I’m right here—”

“I thought they’d  _ killed  _ you—”

“—let’s get you out of the rain—”

“—and I didn’t have my phone, and Quincey is gone, and—”

“—Poppy.”

She froze, her rant cut short by the way her name—her  _ real  _ name—sounded on his lips. Their eyes met, and for the first time since they’d reunited, she could see quite clearly what her absence had done to him as well. Despite the chiseled planes of his face fairing no differently than they ever did, the apprehension and outright  _ worry  _ that shined behind amber stoicism was enough to cut her to her core, cutting her rant short in favor of simply being there, trapped within the broken gaze of a man who needed little more from her in that moment than her presence.

He desperately wanted to tell her everything in those few seconds that spanned eternity. Life had indeed slowed down for a blessed instant, just as his mentor had assured him it would, and as he peered up into the soulful eyes that still wept for him, a gaze that, despite all that had transpired, still held no malice or resentment toward him, the words died in his mouth, halted by years of conditioning to feel nothing, to embrace isolation. He choked, cradling her frame in his arm, and buried his forehead into the curve of her neck in defeat.

“Tora, I love you.”

The words shot through his body like lightning.

“I’m… I’m so sorry.”

He lifted his head and frowned at her, confusion blending indiscernibly with concern.

“I didn’t want to say anything because I didn’t want to make you uncomfortable, and then everything happened tonight and I thought I’d never get the chance, and I’m so, so  _ sorry _ —” she buried her fingers into his hair once more, clutching onto him and sobbing anew, “so I want you to know now, before anything like this ever happens again, that I  _ love  _ you, I love you, and I want to tell you a thousand times—"

He kissed her. It was a heavy confession, much more than he was able to contend with then and there, but nevertheless the words soothed him more than any salve, any bandage could ever come close to treating the wounds that he’d never known he had. He carried her as they battled, his feet traveling to the stairs he’d spotted and his arm beginning to grow weak from the effort of supporting her body for so long. His side ached and his head was swimming and yet it all fell short of the rushed affirmation that he was  _ loved _ . He didn’t deserve it, and was far from knowing whether he was even capable of returning it, but it was the first time anybody had ever told him as much, and the weight of it made him dizzy as he dropped both of them gently to the ground.

Poppy straddled his lap as he sunk against the wall, reaching indelicately for the jacket he’d dropped there earlier and wrapping it around her shoulders to shield her from the breeze that had begun to pass through now that the storm was calming. The din from inside had only increased now that the authorities were assessing the full extent of what had occurred, but Tora found that he cared only for one thing in that instant, and it was the way her swollen lips felt against his as he kissed them again and again, trembling with the effort of just simply surviving the moment, even as the sound of screeching tires came to an abrupt halt near the gate that remained closed cross the lot.

“We have to go, sweetheart,” he murmured to her halfheartedly, his body screaming at him not to move all the same. Quincey would have sent someone for him, he was sure, and they had precious few minutes left before they were discovered even hidden as they were. Still, he was a man of honor, and when presented with a gift of this magnitude, he knew it was his duty to at least attempt to give something back. It was the way things worked in his world; nothing was free, and this was a debt he’d happily spend the rest of his life attempting to repay. “We can talk about all that when you’re safe.”

He expected her to protest, to try and hold him captive until he answered her, but when she simply nodded and pawed at her eyes before grabbing her purse from where he’d placed it earlier, he knew they would have much more to discuss than what she’d said to him that evening. He’d attempted to keep her isolated from this, to postpone what he knew was inevitable and had finally come to a head, and he owed at least as much to her as an explanation as to just how much danger she was in if she truly felt that way about him. Still, he supposed, it was  _ her  _ decision to make for herself, not his, and as she took his hand to help him up off the cement, he found himself oddly prepared to help equip her to do so.

They walked together, then, hands interlaced and minds eerily clear as they approached the car that waited faithfully to take them away from contained bedlam. He opened the door and helped her into the back seat, then slid in after her, offering no contest as she curled into his uninjured side with a light shiver and a sigh. His palm found its way onto her hip, drawing her closer to him as the vehicle sped away as quickly as it had arrived, and as they sat together, haggard, injured, and soaking wet…

He leaned his head against the window and smiled.


	4. The Golden Notebook

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Rewrite any classic fairy tale using the characters of MPL. (I chose The Golden Goose. I have no affiliation with the brand names mentioned in this story, nor do I think they would want me to, given the context...)

Once upon a time, there lived a man named Vincent who had three sons. The youngest son, Quincey, was Vincent’s most beloved, and was spoiled with all he’d ever desired. The second son, Goliath, was not as cherished, but had managed to win the old man’s respect through his cunning and usefulness. Tora, the third son, had apparently been born with shit luck, and was constantly being subjected to the old man’s bullshit through no fault of his own. Tora despised Vincent in return, but had nowhere else to go, and so he was stuck for the time being.

As it so happened, one day Quincey wanted to venture into the city and try to make a name for himself. Knowing that his youngest son was sheltered and naive, Vincent saw fit to equip him with a pack of cigarettes and a flask of fine liquor, telling him, “Go, my son, and use these items to your advantage. Bribe anyone who is not willing to accommodate you, and you shall find success.”

And so Quincey left, feeling certain that he would find glory along his travels.

No sooner did Quincey cross over into the city limits did he happen upon an old woman who was hunched in front of a filthy stoop. Much to his horror, the old woman had the audacity to speak to him. Her voice sounded like gravel that had just finished the 100m dash, and as he listened to her, he recoiled in disgust.

“Hey, kid, ya got a cigarette and a little somethin’ to take the edge off for an old woman?”

Unable to bring himself to engage her, Quincey turned from her and fled.

Upon his brother’s embarrassing return, Goliath decided to pick up the slack and propositioned their father to allow him to go in his stead. “Quincey is much too innocent for such a quest,” he declared confidently, “send me so that I may make a name for our family!”

And so Vincent equipped Goliath as he had done Quincey. As he tucked the Marlboros into Goliath’s pocket with a smirk, he praised his cunning and wished him well. “Go, my son, and use these items to help you on your quest. Should anyone attempt to stop you, cast them down with confidence. Show them that we are not to be trifled with.”

The old woman on the stoop met Goliath as well, and just as she had done with Quincey, she coughed hoarsely and asked for some comforts. Goliath cast her away with a scowl and a wave of his hand: “This shit ain’t cheap, lady, but I’m sorry ‘bout yer luck. I don’t have anything for ya.”

Just as he’d finished turning the old woman down, a thug emerged from the alley and stabbed him, making off with his wallet. “Ah, fuck! That shit hurts!” he exclaimed, and returned home unsuccessful.

With both brothers having been wounded from their attempts to venture into the city, Tora sighed heavily and rolled his eyes. Figuring that he would have to do their jobs for them, as usual, he reluctantly approached Vincent and said that he would venture into the city to make a name for their family.

“You? The hell you gonna do, _frown_ people into submission?” Vincent spat at him. “You better not fuck this up like your brothers did.”

Accustomed to their father’s tantrums, Tora was unphased. “Do ya have anything that might help me out, then?”

“Just get out of here. Don’t come back until you’ve done something with yourself.”

Tora left. As tends to happen in these sorts of tales, the old woman also greeted him just inside the city, as she had done with his two brothers prior. 

“Hey there young man,” she wheezed at him, “ya got anything you can spare for an old lady like me?”

Tora patted his pockets and sighed. “Look, I got--” he pulled two rolled cigarettes and a crumpled bottle of Dasani from his cargo pants, “--a couple of loosies and some water? Ain’t much, but this economy’s fucked.”

“That’ll do.” 

Content with his offer, the old woman patted the stoop next to her so that Tora would join her. As he handed a smoke and the water to the old woman, he watched in fascination as the items transformed before his very eyes! There, in her gnarled hands, sat instead a vape pen and two steaming mugs of jasmine tea. As they sipped and smoked together, the old woman grinned mysteriously. “Name’s Alice. You have a good heart, kid, so I’ma let you in on a little secret: If ya go look in that dumpster over there, you’re gonna find somethin’ nice for yaself.”

“...seriously?”

“Don’t get judgy. What were you expecting, an oak chest just magically sitting in the middle of the street?”

Tora did not judge her storage techniques, and instead went rummaging through the dumpster as instructed. Within its reeking confines sat a notebook with pages of pure gold. He lifted it out and tucked it into his hoodie pocket, and after giving the old woman a final nod of his head, he ventured forth into the city where he happened upon a sleazy motel. Recalling his father’s instructions not to return until something monumental had happened, he threw a $50 bill onto the counter and helped himself to a room.

Now, the motel employed three daughters who had watched their handsome guest arrive and they wanted to get themselves a piece of That Ass. The eldest daughter, who remembered the young man from her previous job at the city’s train station, fished the master key from the desk drawer and entered his room, but was distracted by the golden notebook that sat on the bedside table. Her curiosity got the best of her, and as she opened it, she saw that the notebook contained several pages of juicy blackmail.

“This will certainly help me and my two sisters break out of this shithole,” she thought to herself, “since we can use this to bribe our way to riches!” When she attempted to steal the notebook, however, she found that her hand had stuck to its pages and she could not lift it from the desk. Not wanting to wake the sleeping man for fear of being accused of theft, she used her free hand and texted her sisters for help.

When the second sister arrived, she gasped and reached out to pry her sister’s hand from the notebook. As soon as her hand touched her, it stuck fast! “This is bullshit,” she whispered, “I should have known he wasn’t worth it when he gave us a fake number the  _ first  _ time.”

“You  _ know  _ him!?” 

“Yeah, we figured he was a sugar daddy the last time we saw him, but he’s just an asshole--”

“What’s going on?” The third sister had arrived to help. 

“Nothing, we’re just mysteriously stuck to a golden notebook that this meathead dragged in,” the first two replied dejectedly. 

“Oh, that guy that pranked us with the sausage number?” She reached out to move her sisters out of the way so that she could curse at the sleeping man, and found her hand equally as stuck as the first two. 

“Well, shit, now what do we do?”

The three sisters waited like that until morning, when a very annoyed Tora woke to find the three of them creeping on him while they were trapped there after trying to pilfer his shit. As punishment, Tora grabbed the notebook and left, dragging the three sisters along with him as he carried it by his side. 

It wasn’t long on his journey before he happened upon the thug who had stabbed his brother. The thug grinned and leapt out of the shadows, blocking Tora’s path with a flourish. “My name is Scharch, and I’ll take that notebook--” he paused for effect, waggling his eyebrows lecherously, “--and the broads, too.” 

Tora was unimpressed by the thug, and held the notebook out with the women still attached. “Go ahead and fuckin’ try, dick,” he taunted, and grinned when Scharch, too, found himself unable to let go of the precious item.

“Th-the hell is this!?” Scharch flapped angrily with his hand in an attempt to release himself from the notebook, but to no avail. Now serenaded by a litany of curse words, Tora continued on his way.

Further into the city, a second thug appeared, much flashier than the first. Upon seeing the crowd that was traveling together, he grinned victoriously. What an opportunity! Stepping out of the shadows, he held out his hand, stopping Tora and his entourage. “I dunno what you did to drag my friend along with you, here,” he said as he gestured toward Scharch, “but my name is Claude, and I’m gonna need you to hand over all your shit.”

As Tora held up the notebook in a wide sweep, hurling the entire crowd forward with it, Scharch cried out in a panicked voice: “Bro,  _ don’t--” _

But it was too late! Claude had touched the notebook, and was stuck.

Delighted by this new and unusual source of power, Tora continued on, lowkey irritated as Scharch and Claude began to see fit to flirt with the three sisters who still struggled to keep up with his long strides.

Having taken such a long journey, the eldest brother found himself growing hungry, and so he stopped to get a bite to eat at Fred and Fran’s Famous Sausages, renowned for both their meats and their lack of questions. “I’m gonna put you guys down here and go take a leak,” he addressed the group, and sat the notebook down on the counter to anchor his parade of tagalongs. 

While Tora was gone, Fred and Fran appeared to address the group’s orders. The notebook sat like glitter against the worn countertop, and despite the five voices that cried out---“For the love of God,  _ don’t touch it!” _ \--Fred and Fran found themselves affixed to the notebook when they attempted to clear it from their dining space. When Tora returned from the restroom, he smirked, retrieved two chili dogs from the kitchen to fill his belly, and continued on his journey with all seven in miserable tow.

It wasn’t long before Tora happened upon a furious young man sitting next to a woman whose beauty was incomparable to anything he’d ever seen before. The only thing was, she was as deadpan as he was, and the asshole sitting next to her seemed perfectly content to leave her like that. When Tora decided to ask, the young man responded through gritted teeth, “I dunno man, she’s in a pissy mood today and I’m tired of dealing with it. If you can cheer her up, you can  _ have her _ .” 

Intrigued by the woman’s beauty and feeling a strong sense of duty to rescue her from such a fine specimen of fuckboi, Tora held the notebook up in front of her, yanking all seven arms attached along with it. “Good thing I came along, sweetheart,” he allowed a smile to showcase his dimples, as they were the only mythical powers he knew he possessed, “look, I’ve brought you some balloons.”

The sight of all of the people attached to Tora’s notebook, and the resounding groan from each of them at his terrible joke, inspired such a fit of giggles from the woman that the young man grew even angrier. 

“Now wait a second, buddy, if I’d have known it would have been that easy for you I wouldn’t have agreed to this,” he yelled, stamping his foot in protest.

The woman rolled her eyes. “Well, Julri, maybe if you’d have made a real effort, you wouldn’t have to go back on your deal.”

“Whatever, Poppy, we both know you’re just doing this because you’re hungry--” 

“What’s it gonna take, then, asshole?” Tora’s voice was clear and intimidating over the squabble, bringing everything to a screeching halt. 

“Fine. You want her that bad?” Julri pulled a can of La Croix from his backpack. “Find me somebody who can drink this  _ entire thing  _ without complaining about the way it tastes.”

Marveling at such a challenge, Tora set the notebook down and left his crew behind while he left to consult with the old woman who had started all this nonsense in the first place. Where she had sat, however, was a different man now, with trembling hands and tired eyes. Upon seeing Tora, he cried out for him: “Oh, young man, young man! I have such a thirst, but everything around is much too flavorful. I have lost all lust for fun and enjoyment in my old age, and I must find something that makes me want to cry when I drink it!”

“Have I got the fuckin’ drink for you, old man. What’s ya name?”

“My name is Martin!”

“C’mon, Martin,” said Tora, and he led him back to the young man and woman where the can of La Croix sat untouched. “Get a load of that bullshit, and it should fix ya right up.”

As Martin drank, and drank, and drank, the group waited with held breath. 

“Un-fucking-believable,” muttered Scharch, who had cringed when Martin popped the can tab.

“A goddamned legend,” said Claude, whose belly shuddered in terror.

“Absolute perfection,” declared Martin, who crushed the can in his fist and sighed happily. “It’s as if a strawberry had depression. Thank you, my boy.” 

As Martin went on his way, Tora gestured toward Poppy once more, but Julri wasn’t satisfied. “That was too easy,” he growled. “Find me somebody who’s able to eat fifty shitty hotdogs in one sitting.”

“Done.” Tora slid his cell phone from his back pocket and called Gyu, who was his father’s newest employee. “Hey, bring your ass down here,” he said to his friend, who was the scrawniest and most impoverished of all his father’s clan. “Got a job for ya.”

And so Gyu dutifully answered the call to service, and upon his arrival, was met with Tora, seven furious stowaways, a fuming young man, and a beautiful girl with the giggles. Amongst the crowd sat a platter of fifty plain hotdogs. “Whatcha need, man?”

“Think ya can eat all that on your own?”   
  
“What, like, for free?”

“Yeah. Have at it. On the house.”

“Fuck yeah I can,” Gyu responded, his eyes glittering. Gyu had not yet proven his worth to Tora’s father and was accustomed to having to beg for his food, and so the group sat and watched in horrified wonder as the blonde made his way through the platter with frightening speed, content to gorge himself on a meal he did not have to pay for.

When he finished, he licked his fingers and grinned triumphantly. “Thanks bro, should hold me over for a couple days.”

“Whatever. Just get home before my asshole dad realizes ya slackin’ off.”

Gyu went on his way with a full belly, leaving Julri behind in a panic. When Tora once again gestured toward Poppy, Julri pulled her backward and glared at him. “Look, I’ll give you that I underestimated you, but this last one is something nobody will be able to beat.” 

Annoyed, but intrigued by the challenge, Tora raised an eyebrow. “The fuck is it this time?”

“You gotta find something as hated as it is loved. Legendary. I’m talking something that turns heads both out of adoration and fear, out of lust and disgust. Bring back something that people love to shit on but secretly covet. Do this, and she’s yours, man.” 

Stumped, Tora turned and left, wondering if all this bullshit was really worth some strange girl he’d barely even met. Still, he wasn’t one to back down from a trial, and so he returned once more to the stoop where the old woman sat. “Oi.”

“Well, if it isn’t Mister Popular.” The old woman chuckled as Tora’s eyes rolled.

“I gotta find some shit that people love to hate but kinda also want for themselves. Ya got anything like that hidden in ya sleeves?”

The woman took a long drag on her vape pen and nodded sagely. “Yes, yes, such an item is rare, but since you remembered ya manners earlier, I think I can help.” She patted her robes indiscriminately and eventually pulled a key ring from one of the pockets, holding it out to him as the keys glinted in the smog. “I’m too old for this anymore, so take good care of it. I think it’ll be just the thing.” 

“Keys?” 

“To the car, ya dunce.” 

Tora rubbed his eyes and squinted, as where there had been no vehicle prior, there sat an ostentatious red race car. The vehicle screamed horsepower, and yet, it also definitively gave the aura of somebody who  _ desperately  _ needed to be noticed. As he gazed upon the outrageous spoiler on the trunk and the OEM smoked headlight covers that made absolutely no impact on performance, he felt himself grin in anticipation. “Perfect.”

And so Tora returned in his new car, squealing up to the curb in a comically unsafe lack of consideration for human life. Devoted to the cause, he made certain to park it crookedly so that people would be forced to admire the enormous inconvenience as they went about their business.

As soon as Julri spotted the beautiful eyesore, his stomach dropped, for he knew that he had been defeated. He released his hold on Poppy and walked off, secretly wishing that he, too, had a flashy 310-horsepower car to sit in during stop-and-go city traffic. At long last, Tora released the unruly crowd from his notebook and sent them each on their way with a terrifying glare. 

With a happy sigh, Poppy ducked awkwardly low into the passenger-side bucket seat, marveling at how something could be so beautiful, yet so uncomfortable at the same time. As Tora drove the two of them off into the sunset at a roaring 27 miles per hour, she stared at him dreamily, knowing her prince had finally come.


	5. Symbiosis

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A combined prompt: A character must accidentally see another naked. Characters must also share a bed/blanket/small space.
> 
> This chapter is NSFW.

“Tora, don’t you think this is a little bit...excessive?”

Silence met her ears, but the man’s stoicism was no real surprise to her anymore. He’d scarcely said a word since he had shown up in a hurry following her phone call, and although she was truly grateful to have the other man’s assistance, his refusal to acknowledge anything about what was happening was beginning to cause her reassurance to transition back into anxiety. Had anyone asked her why she had decided to call him instead of the police, she’d have struggled to find an answer, but nevertheless she had been deeply relieved when his original offer to help if anything happened still held water between them.

As she hurried to keep up with his brisk pace, she frowned, trying to cling to the irritation she typically felt when she was being treated like a child. This wasn’t his usual overprotective behavior, though; Tora was known to be dramatic in his measures to ensure her safety, but this was apparently far more serious, and as a result her irritation faltered in the face of frenetic worry. He’d done little else than to guide her--less than gently--back to his car, drive her to a part of town she didn’t recognize, and demand that she keep up with him as he stormed out of the parking garage in a flurry of chain smoking and muttered curse words. 

It wasn’t until they’d climbed several flights of stairs and arrived at a nondistinct apartment door that she finally put her foot down, panting heavily and red in the face, her hands around one of his forearms in a desperate bid to get him to slow down. Tora ignored her completely, but did not pull his arm away as he unlocked the door and kicked it open. Dragging Poppy closer by the grip she still kept firm on him, he nudged her through the doorway, followed after her, and then shut the door behind both of them. The sound of the deadbolt hitting home was the final, echoing shout to her that something was genuinely very wrong.

“Tora,  _ please, _ ” she swiped her bangs away from her face in irritation, wishing for half a second that she didn’t sacrifice quite so many ponytail holders to the man in front of her, “can you at  _ least  _ tell me where we are?”

“This is my apartment.”

“Y-your...apartment?” Poppy blinked. Memories of a half-naked Quincey came flooding back in an instant, surrounded by opulent decor and lavish accents. “I thought--I thought you said you lived at the condo?”

Tora was kneeling on the far side of the room, fishing for something in a side closet as she spoke. The man hadn’t stopped moving from the moment he’d arrived at her own apartment, and his uncharacteristic restlessness did little to comfort her. His voice was a thick mumble from behind the door, and she strained to hear him, too nervous to move from the entryway. “Might as well, I’m fuckin’ there often enough.” He finally straightened and flapped his hand against an old comforter he’d dug out from the depths of the closet. Poppy watched as he then smelled it, shrugged, and walked it back over to toss the blanket onto the couch. “Ya stayin’ here tonight.” 

“Tora--”

“Not up for argument.” He scrubbed at his scalp for a moment and then pinched the bridge of his nose, irritated. “Take the couch. I’ll sleep on the floor.” 

“You don’t have a bed?”

“Don’t need one. I got a couch.” 

Poppy took a deep breath to address  _ that  _ particular issue, and then let it out in a slow bleed, choosing instead to pick her battles now that she was properly on his turf. She watched him for a moment, wondering where his mind was as he aggressively stabbed away at the keyboard on his phone, and made one final attempt at diffusing the brewing tempest in front of her by leaning against the arm of the couch and picking at her cuticle. “I don’t… I didn’t exactly have time to pack a bag, you know?”

“No shit,” his tone was harsh and distracted, bringing a flinch to her face that he missed entirely, still trying to make the letters on his screen behave. “I still have some of my old clothes around here somewhere. You can wear those until we figure something out.” He paused and glanced up from his keyboard for a moment, then crushed the send button and slid the phone back into his pocket. “Hell, if ya text Quince, he’ll probably have ya a new fuckin’ wardrobe by tomorrow morning. He loves that shit.”

Before Poppy could respond, Tora’s back was to her once more, his attention devoted to digging back through the same closet from which he’d pulled the comforter. She could hear the distinct sound of a zipper being ripped open and watched the muscles in his back flex beneath his t-shirt as he searched, apparently lost in his unspoken cause. A sigh left her and so did most of her energy, the adrenaline and worry of the evening finally waning in favor of resolute exhaustion. Feeling defeated, she stood and glared at the man still immersed in the closet. “Is it alright with  _ you _ if I at least take a shower?”

Finally, she had gotten through to him. His actions stilled for a moment, and though he didn’t turn to look at her, his voice was much softer in his response: “Yeah, sure. I’ll lay ya clothes out.” He waited until he could hear her footsteps travel off toward the wet room and sighed, pawing at his temples for a long moment. He’d known this was going to happen at some point, and had he paid more attention to the shit he was  _ supposed  _ to instead of thinking with his dick so often, he probably could have prevented it, but…

He shoved the backpack aside and moved onto the duffle that had sat underneath it, hoping he hadn’t been lying when he’d said he had held on to some of his older clothing. It wasn’t that he held any particular sentiment toward his possessions, at least not those ones, but his old habits of hoarding what little he’d had turned out to be more difficult to break than he anticipated. Finding that the collection of old band t-shirts and cargo shorts had, at some point, been replaced with untraceable firearms and concealment gear, he sighed, disgusted with himself. 

As much as he might enjoy seeing her clad only in leather gloves and a shy smile, he relented, sitting back on his heels with a huff.

His thoughts continued to race as he maneuvered back to the small chest of drawers he kept in the side room he supposed was originally intended to be a bedroom of sorts. He’d never really anticipated having a girl over, and certainly not one that meant more to him than a night of anonymous fun, so now that he was faced with the reality that he had no real way of accommodating her outside of giving her the grossly uncomfortable couch to sleep on, he found himself regretting his decision to bring her over at all. From a safety standpoint there was no question; he needed her where he could keep an eye on her properly while he sorted this mess out, but from a  _ personal  _ angle?

_ Hey, Bobby, I know I’ve been tripping over myself to impress you even though I’m fuckin’ awkward and kill people for a living. Here’s my shithole apartment with no bed and no door on the bathroom-- _

He stopped. As if on cue, he could hear the water cut on, pouring from the showerhead in a rush.

It had been a no-brainer for him, living as a paranoid bachelor. He’d never ordered so much as delivery, much less invited anyone over to where he laid his head down at night, and so it hadn’t been at all strange to him to remove the door to the washroom. Being able to keep one eye on the doorway while he was at his most vulnerable had brought him some semblance of pathetic relief, and until now, there’d never been anyone present to question it. As he instinctively turned his head toward the sound, however, he realized that he was now faced with  _ two  _ insurmountable challenges for which he was hugely unprepared:

One, the only woman in recent memory to stick around long enough to hold both his attention and his respect was now fully nude and accessible in his own home, and two…

Tora groaned.

Two, he was going to have to somehow find a way to place a towel and some clothing in the same room as her naked body  _ without  _ seeing her in there.

As he dug out a plain shirt and began to search for any sort of pants that wouldn’t completely fall off of her, he ground his teeth together, wondering if he could sneak in a cigarette before she finished. He had infiltrated the strongest of security systems before, had tricked even the most experienced clients into focusing on  _ anything  _ else but him, but this… Leave it to her to complicate something as simple as this. He snorted and finally pulled a pair of basketball shorts out, pleased to discover that it was one of the few pairs from which he hadn’t pulled the drawstring in a fit of irritated rage. 

_ In and out. Easy. Just close your fuckin’ eyes, be a gentleman, drop the shit on the sink and leave. _

He looked down at the outfit clutched in his fist and rolled his eyes at himself. Above all else, he despised dishonesty, and he wasn’t about to make a habit of becoming a liar--not even to himself. This wasn’t going to be easy at all, and he supposed the longer he stood around whining about it, the less time he gave himself to complete the task at hand. Steeling himself with one final, deep breath, he stalked across the apartment with a false sense of confidence and reached awkwardly in, grateful as he always was for his above-average size. The clothing fell into the sink without fanfare, and he dipped back out with a brief sigh of relief, until his brain kicked in once more.

_ Shit. The towel. _

He came dangerously close to just yelling at her to fuckin’ drip dry, then composed himself, clamping down on his temper. Theoretically, he’d put  _ himself  _ in this situation by whisking her away without so much as a chance to grab her toothbrush--if it was even still fuckin’ there--and so he had no one else to blame, as badly as he wanted a scapegoat. Grateful that he’d at least invested in more than one towel at one point, he snagged it from the closet with an aggressive swipe and returned to the entrance of the bathroom, pointedly ignoring the screaming desire to ask if she’d like help washing her hair.

With a roll of his eyes, he mentally cursed himself, wondering if this was payback for all the shit he’d done in his life. The gods certainly had a sense of humor, if so.

Swinging around the door jamb, he tossed the towel on top of the clothes, complacency overriding his earlier paranoia after he’d successfully avoided her the first time. Before he ducked back out, however, his eyes naturally traveled to the far side of the room where she still stood with her back to him, her hands braced against the wall. Water ran down the curves of her body in rapid tendrils, taking with them the thick lather she’d managed to work up from the cracked bar of soap that sat on the tray between the faucet handles. He watched the rivulets carry along until he stopped cold, his mouth dry as his eyes fixated on the uninhibited view of the backside he’d once come so close to holding onto as their mouths had crushed together…

Tora felt the blood in his body rush to his loins as his stomach dropped with equal haste, watching in horrified slow motion as Poppy dropped her hands from the wall and began to turn back into the shower stream. He launched himself out of the room and clutched at his chest, his heart pounding, and crushed a hand over his eyes as if to erase the sight of her body glistening amongst the steam. “Fuck me, fuck me,  _ fuck-- _ ” he growled, the guilt of seeing her body when he wasn’t supposed to  _ yet again  _ not quite strong enough to override the undiluted arousal that now coursed through his body. The sight of her chest bouncing in front of him as she’d caught the notes he’d tossed to her was still a great deal more vivid in his mind than he’d ever let on to her, picture or no, and now, coupled with the voyeuristic glimpse of her body that had just nailed him right where it counted… 

The mafia enforcer patted aggressively at his pockets, digging out his pack of cigarettes with more force than he’d reach for a first aid kit. It was going to be a very long night.

~~

It was late.

Poppy wasn’t sure what time it was, and the effort it would take for her to find her cell phone and check was far too great compared to the temptation to remain seated and brooding on the couch, instead. Despite the exhaustion that racked her body, she knew that sleep was simply a lost cause; her thoughts were much too tumultuous to have any hope of even resting, much less crashing out. Swallowing the tears that welled in her throat for probably the hundredth time since they’d bedded down, she leaned her head against the back of the couch and hugged her knees, grateful that the shirt Tora had lent her for the night was baggy enough to encase her curled body.

The day had been as normal as any other, really. She’d gained some decent momentum in finally digging into Quincey’s latest piece, which was, in her opinion, on track to be yet another bestseller if she played her cards right. The blonde had finally begun trusting her enough to allow her some free reign with his writing, and they had spent a great deal of the day together simply bonding over gossip and iced coffee, taking advantage of Tora’s rare absence by discussing him almost exclusively instead of talking shop. It hadn’t been until she’d finally stopped by her apartment to get changed before trying to tempt Tora into a dinner date that she’d discovered what had happened in her absence. 

The first clue had been the broken lock, horrifically accented by the wooden splinters that lay beneath like dull glitter across the floor. Her heart had leapt in her chest as she’d pushed the door open, revealing a scene that looked as if a hurricane had ripped through. It was impossible to stop herself from seeing it over and over whether she closed her eyes or not; visions of shattered plant pots and tossed furniture flashed across her memory, punctuated with the sinking dread of wondering if she’d even been properly alone. 

She’d stepped in anyway, gazing upon her thrashed belongings as nausea swelled within her belly, unable to take it all in as she sunk to the middle of the floor and wept. Truth be told, she had very few valuables, and even fewer that she’d consider irreplaceable, but the overwhelming sensation of being  _ violated _ , of having her safest space utterly invaded… She shivered and buried her face between her knees, unable to keep the tears from tumbling from her eyelashes at long last. 

Tora had been quick to arrive when she’d called him, her voice trembling and words too thick to say properly. He’d found her in the same spot, the remains of a crushed plant clutched protectively, but uselessly, between her sweating palms. The look in his eyes had been unlike she’d ever seen before when he surveyed her surroundings: it had been dark, and  _ vicious _ , as if he’d stepped out of his own body and been replaced by a remorseless predator. No sooner did he recognize what had happened than he’d plucked her from the floor and removed her, saying little else other than she wasn’t to return there until he’d said it was safe.

Her eyes flicked down at the man who was laid out on the floor next to her, his head pillowed on tattooed arms and breathing steady. In spite of her dour mood, she found it impossible not to smile--she’d be willing to bet whatever she had left that the time for her to return to her little apartment would be a very passionate, “never.”

All things considered, his kindness still surprised her with relative frequency. Even though his delivery could use some polish, she was deeply grateful that he had not only opened his home to her for her own safety, but had even done his best to make sure she was as comfortable as she could be while she was there. The shower had helped to lift her spirits a great deal, and the clothes he’d laid out for her were comically oversized and soft, having been thoroughly broken in from years of wear. They smelled just enough like him to bring her an ounce of comfort as the minutes ticked by, not quite so tainted by the overpowering cologne of cigarettes that usually hovered around him. Still, she mused, she couldn’t help but feel a little guilty, watching him sleep bare-chested on the floor with no pillow or blanket while she was tucked up on the cushions in a veritable nest.

Shifting quietly so as not to wake him, she stripped the comforter from her body and hovered, hesitant. She’d never been around Tora when he was asleep before, and knew she was taking a risk of ruining it just the same, but after all the times he’d helped her and asked very little in return, she was beginning to feel as though she owed him a much greater debt than could be satisfied by the odd bento box and a brief kiss. Taking just a moment to admire him before she covered him up, she gathered the blanket in her hands and draped it over him gently, tucking it neatly against his sides.

It was a drop in the bucket, but there was also a dichotomous sort of validation in it all. She’d called him out on it the first time they’d dined with each other, awkwardly blurting out that she knew he wasn’t the aggressive bad boy he made himself out to be. Over time, despite his insistence to the contrary, he’d demonstrated just that--and now that she had  _ really  _ needed him, she’d been equally stunned to see that perhaps she hadn’t been all the way correct, either. The aura that had rolled off of the man when he’d seen the fallout of the intrusion had been unmistakably cold, and it was just one more mystery to add on to the entire mess that kept her from settling down.

There was something to the man, she knew, that was off limits. It was something sinister lurking behind his eyes that they’d wordlessly agreed not to address; something that, like tonight, kept her up in the twilight hours when she wasn’t so tired that she simply passed out. The trouble was, she couldn’t quite put her finger on whether she was afraid of finding out the truth… or if it excited her. At one point, certainly, the concept had terrified her--twice so when Quincey had confirmed it by warning her against prying too far--but now that she’d gotten used to him, and knew that even given the opportunity, he truly meant her no harm… The thought of him using that powerful, malevolent side to  _ protect  _ her stirred feelings within her that she’d never have thought remotely possible.

Lost in her thoughts as she was, she was enormously ill-prepared for Tora reaching up and gently flicking her in the ribs.

Poppy wasn’t proud of the sound that left her, nor was she impressed by the way she startled violently and froze until she’d realized what happened. Unphased, her impromptu bodyguard simply gazed up at her, his face unreadable, until she settled into a flustered glare in response. His hand lingered against her side for a moment, the backs of his fingers trailing against the curve of her waist until he returned to crossing his arms behind his head. When he finally spoke, his voice was a low murmur. “Can’t sleep?”

Her face softened and she shook her head, her throat raw from the emotions that still sat there like a hot stone.

“Is it the couch?”

His delivery was as flat as it ever was, and even in spite of the storm that continued to rage within her mind she found herself barking out a laugh, more grateful now than ever for his unusually dry humor. “No, I think it’s even better without a pillow, honestly. I can totally see why you do this to yourself.” 

He snorted softly, letting his eyes fall shut. “Never promised ya the Hilton, sweetheart.”

“No, but you did promise to show up if I ever needed you, and I guess…” She sighed deeply and pressed her palms to her eyes for a moment, emotionally spent. “I’m sorry I needed to take advantage of that, but… thanks. For being there today.”

Silence met her ears, though it brought a grin to her face. If there was anything Tora handled more awkwardly than affection, it was gratitude. The memory of the first time she’d thanked him sincerely fluttered back to her, when she’d stopped him cold in her apartment and forced him to listen to her praise for saving her the  _ first  _ time she’d launched herself into peril, and the way he’d smiled at her when he’d realized she wasn’t joking… It was a wonder she’d ever thought she stood a chance against him at all. 

A comfortable silence settled between them once more as she turned the memories over in her head, clinging to the distraction of happy thoughts instead of reliving the discovery of her apartment for the thousandth time. Just as she’d thought Tora had fallen back asleep, his voice cut the darkness once more, smooth and husky. 

“Ya cold up there?”

“N-not really, no.” She wasn’t  _ entirely  _ lying, but she didn’t want him to sacrifice the only blanket between them, either.

“Just gonna keep stretchin’ out that shirt, then?”

A rosy tint burned on her cheeks at the accusation. Feeling contrite, she slid her legs out from underneath the shirt, smoothing at the front of it in an attempt to undo any possible damage. A chuckle rumbled up from where Tora was still laid out on the floor before a rough, warm hand smoothed its way down the back of her arm. 

“There’s an awful lot of room down here, ya know. Be a shame if it went to waste.” As if to punctuate the statement, the man stretched languidly, rolling himself in the comforter as he yawned with more volume than necessary. “Pity there’s no cold, frightened girl to share this blanket with me. Guess I’ll just have to sleep down here all by myself--”

“Oh my god, Tora,” she collapsed into a fit of giggles, finally unable to contain them. “Just tell me you want me to come snuggle up to you.” She declined to wait for his undoubtedly crass response and instead slid downward from the couch cushions, planting herself underneath the corner of the blanket that he’d wordlessly lifted for her. All at once, the intense heat from his body slammed into her and she found herself powerless to stop herself from pressing into the broad chest that had turned to meet her, shivering from the sheer force of her body finally,  _ finally  _ shedding the tension that had carried her this far.

Tora blinked, unsure. 

It wasn’t that he was a  _ stranger  _ to contact. He’d had countless women over the years cross various boundaries of his with and without his consent, particularly as he’d begun to transition from a scrawny teen to a tattooed, muscular man. He rarely paid it much attention, finding it much easier to allow them to do as they pleased instead of wasting his time and energy swatting flies. This particular instance, however, was proving to be altogether different, and as the woman he’d all but kidnapped that evening sighed happily and pressed her forehead against his collarbones, he found himself grabbing a fistful of the comforter to keep himself from disrespecting her.

Poppy’s head was pillowed against his shoulder, her skin cool against his while they lay together. He watched her in the dark for a long moment, fighting--and failing--to keep his thoughts trained on the new mission of finding whoever had the balls to go after her while he was distracted. Although the rage he felt was very real, with her lying right there in front of him, it was nearly impossible to see anything other than the way she had looked in the shower earlier, and the urge to move her hair aside and show her just how much she had affected him that evening was growing stronger by the second…

Shifting awkwardly so he could move his hips away from her, he sighed to himself, wondering if it would be particularly weird to shove the blanket between them as an extra preventative measure. The action backfired entirely, however, when Poppy instead grabbed his wrist and pulled it around her body, closing the distance he’d just created by pressing the rest of her body as close to him as she could get. Despite the invitation, Tora froze completely, staring pointedly ahead at the couch behind her head even as she sighed at him in exasperation. 

“You know, we really gotta work on those ‘comforting a girl’ skills of yours, Mister Lockpicking-Parkour-Expert.”

He snorted. “My deepest apologies,” the way her breasts pressed against his torso was nearly too maddening to stand as he ground out the sarcastic concession from between clenched teeth, “for not realizing I was supposed to let ya climb me like a fuckin’ monkey.” 

Poppy mulled his words over for a moment, then leaned away from him a scarce few inches, just far enough that she could trace the tattoos on his chest as she spoke. “I don’t bite, you know.”

“Sweetheart, after getting punched in the face, thrown down the stairs and  _ tased _ , I think I’d prefer the biting.” 

He’d intended for it to make her laugh, but when a thick quietude settled over them, he frowned, wondering if he’d pushed it too far. Her hand paused against his chest and a deep sigh followed. 

“I guess I haven’t been very nice to you, have I?”

“...huh?”

She reached up and rubbed at her eyes for a moment, then slid her hand down to lay against the side of her neck as she avoided meeting his gaze. “I just… I guess I’ve been thinking about it a lot tonight, and for all the help you’ve given me, all I seem to do is lead you on wild goose chases and stress you out.” Even in the dark, he could see the blush that bloomed across the bridge of her nose. “...and attack you. And even after all that, you still came, and--”

He waited, watching her struggle to find the correct words.

“--and I guess I just wanted to say thanks, for all of it, and especially for this.” She finally moved her hand, tracing a gentle path down the center of his chest until it came to a pause at his side, her nails grazing the lines of his body above his hip bone. “I feel a lot safer here with you.”

The sincerity behind her words did little to tame what her touch was doing to him, and the proximity of her body to his left frighteningly little to the imagination, should she care to glance down and discover the effects for herself. He bit down on the inside of his cheek for a moment to compose himself, feeling mildly disgusted that he would want to take advantage of her even now, after all she’d been through that day… But the memory of the way her body stretched under the water like a nymph still taunted him, and her fingers were so soft where they still drew little patterns on his skin… 

It was a toss-up between asking her to stop, or urging her to keep going, and he wasn’t sure which he hated more. Deciding to leave it up to her, he reached down and halted her actions with a gentle palm pressed over top of her hand. “Not to sound like an asshole, but if ya keep that up…” he swallowed hard as her thumb moved from underneath his grip, pressing along the groove in his lower abdomen, “I’m gonna be making you feel a lot more than safe.”

The tension in the air was immediately electrified as she picked up on the innuendo, the both of them frozen in anticipation of what was about to follow. Tora could feel his heart pounding in his chest, near-evenly split between irritated and fascinated that such an innocent thing could have such an affect on him when he’d done  _ much  _ filthier things with other women in the past, and  _ none  _ of them had ever come close to causing this caliber of adrenaline rush… It was as if he were a fumbling, awkward virgin again, stealing some contact under the bleachers and praying it led to more.

Poppy’s blush glowed in the muted hues of the apartment as she considered his offer. It wasn’t as if she hadn’t thought about it before; with a specimen like Tora, it would have been nearly impossible to avoid those sorts of thoughts without being completely dead inside. Quincey had been beside himself with delight when she had confessed to him that his writing had inspired her to try things out for herself, and she’d be outright lying if she tried to tell herself that the deeper she dug into the racy novelettes, the more often she found herself imagining one particular man as the dashing protagonist…

Still, the concept of such a commitment was somewhat intimidating to her. She and Tora had never really discussed the growing tension between them, and his commitment to being a respectful gentleman around her despite the feelings she  _ knew  _ he wanted to indulge were as impressive as they were enticing. Julri had never insisted on maintaining such a boundary, instead choosing to push his luck every chance he could get, but Tora… She nibbled at her bottom lip for a moment, then tried a girlish smile. “Maybe you could… make me feel a  _ little  _ more than safe…?”

He paused, having taken her lengthy silence as an indication that she’d heeded his warning. 

“I could...kind of use a distraction, I guess, and…” Her hand slid just a touch further until her fingers dipped behind the elastic waistband of the sweatpants he’d donned. His abdomen hardened to steel against the contact. “...I think you’ve earned a little more than a kiss on the cheek?”

His body was taut as a bowstring that she pulled further with each word, her voice an intoxicating blend of innocence and intent. Suppressing a groan, he pressed his mouth to the top of her head, keeping his hand deliberately still against the small of her back. “I didn’t do this to get in ya pants, sweetheart.” 

The giggle that met his words was musical, even as her fingers slid along his waistband in a playful tease. “Maybe that’s why it worked so well.”

It broke him. Whatever resolve he’d had left, what little self-control he’d still managed to scrape together despite all the stress and temptations of the evening shattered like glass at the way she laughed for him when his hands finally found purchase in her body, rolling her until he could pin her to the floor with a gentle, hungry strength. Kissing her then,  _ really  _ kissing her, was its own special ecstasy, satisfying a nagging curiosity that he’d privately indulged since the day he had watched her from across the table at Alice’s. Her lips were petal soft and pliant, yielding to his advances in an equal frenzy, and as he tasted her he could feel his chest swell with a possessive burn.

Poppy stretched out beneath him, sinking her fingers into the thick shock of hair that had draped down around her as they battled deliciously with one another. She hadn’t anticipated the way his hands would make her feel as they traced her with barely-restrained urgency; instead of the awkward discomfort she’d always felt with Julri, she found herself  _ craving  _ the man above her now, encouraging him just as much with the way she squirmed for him as she did by mimicking her desires against his own flesh. When he finally broke away and descended upon her neck instead, his mouth hot and wet as he raked her with his teeth, she cried out for him, unprepared for the aggressive tactic and yet indulging it hungrily as he lapped at her.

Impressed by her bravery as he always was, Tora rolled back onto his side and pulled her against him as she had done to him earlier, only this time, there was no reason to stop himself from grabbing a handful of the delicious curves he’d secretly glimpsed earlier. What she lacked in experience she made up for with enthusiasm, drawing a hiss from between his teeth as she nibbled indelicately at the base of his throat. He wanted all of her, all at once--to drown in her, to simultaneously lose himself within her caresses and to draw forth every sigh and scream and moan he could pull from her at the height of pleasure. Her hands were clumsy on his body and yet they were everything he needed as she explored him, and as her fingernails dragged a heavy path down the landscape of his abs, he shivered and cursed for her, deliriously lost.

Their pace was obsessive, their actions graceless in their need for one another. As he cupped her breast in his palm and thumbed her nipple through the thin cotton t-shirt, he found himself unable to resist kissing her with a deep slowness, swallowing her breathy moans and eliciting more, as high from the opportunity to have her as he was from simply sowing pleasure instead of pain for once. It wasn’t until his hands began to travel lower that she abruptly took both of his wrists in a firm grip, pulling her mouth away from his in a stunted gasp. 

“Too much?”

“N-no, I just--” she shook her head briefly, dazed, “I just--I don’t know--”

“We can stop if ya want to, sweetheart.” He reached up without breaking her grip and cradled her chin, trying to communicate through touch what he knew would likely fail with words. “You say the word and I’ll sleep in the fuckin’ bathroom.” 

She laughed, smoothing her hands along his forearms. “No, everything is fine, I promise, I just… maybe we can focus on you? This time?” 

Even in the murky city lights that filtered through the apartment’s high windows, he could see the combination of nerves and cautious optimism that often glittered in her eyes. Pressing a kiss to her forehead, he chuckled, then rolled his wrists until he reversed their positions, taking her forearms in his hands, instead. “Fine by me.”

Feeling no protest, he dragged his bottom lip down the bridge of her nose until he could kiss her once more, gently this time. It wasn’t exactly what he was used to; on the rare occasions where he’d set out on a mission to find himself some relief, he’d always been the stoic aggressor, and those he’d chosen were never as flighty or headstrong as the woman currently allowing him to guide her touch down his body.. Her trust thrilled him, so much moreso knowing that he’d earned it of his own accord, and even in the cloud of lust that had overtaken his thoughts, his sense of devotion to preserving that trust in him, no matter the cost, grew tenfold with each agonizing inch that her fingertips trailed across.

Poppy’s confidence didn’t falter this time as he continued to maneuver her hands, foregoing the waistband this time in favor of simply pressing her palm right over his erection and squeezing gently, baring his teeth at the contact. He didn’t deny her initiative as she shifted her grip beneath his and began to work at him of her own accord, her timidness quickly fading away in favor of rapt curiosity as his hips pressed up and into her touch. Emboldened by the throaty growl that escaped him as he continued to demonstrate for her, she kissed him, matching the pace that his gentle thrusts set for the both of them.

It wasn’t long before he pulled away to press his forehead against hers, the heaviness in his gaze holding her attention as he asked without words if she still wanted to go further. She matched his silence, instead choosing to squeeze gently at the head of his arousal in confirmation, awed and enchanted by the way her touch had completely incapacitated the man. It was impossible to look away, even for a second, as his body quivered beside her and his head fell back; it was yet another side of the man she’d been treated to seeing, something much more private and powerful than anything he’d allowed so far, and as the strength in his hand continued to work hers over the hardened flesh that strained within his pants, it suddenly made sense to her why Quincey’s novels always boasted couples who were utterly fascinated by one another.

Unable to wait any longer, Tora reached down and hooked a thumb into the elastic at his waist, slipping his sweatpants down over his hips until he could pull one leg out from its confines. Unrestrained, he guided Poppy’s hand back to his shaft and curled both their fingers around it, growling quietly at how soft her hand felt against his aching flesh. He could distantly feel her free hand sneak its way into his hair and tighten into a fist, pulling him into another kiss as he began to show her just how to stroke him, his breath leaving him in heated gasps as his pleasure began to mount low in his belly. 

He didn’t need to do much more than hold onto her hip as she took the lead, then, swiping her thumb over the thick jewel of arousal that had gathered at the tip after hours of torment and teasing from his thoughts. It was just enough lubricant to aid the way her palm swept across his swollen head and then back down, up down, up down in long, firm strokes that drove him insane and yet pulled him into an intoxicated haze of lazy pleasure at the same time. “Christ, you’re a quick learner, aren’t ya--” he thrust into her grip and quickened her pace, declining to draw it out any further now that he’d been told not to worry about her that evening. “Fuck, Bobby, just… don’t stop.”

Despite the way Tora was consumed by her, and the way his lip fit perfectly between his teeth as he twisted in her hands, Poppy allowed herself a private, thrilled grin when his eyes were shut tight against the ecstasy that coursed through him. She wanted him, and she knew that it was only a matter of time before she surrendered to the temptation of having him touch her like this too, but for now, the sense of power she held over a man normally so untouchable, seemingly built purely from undiluted strength and confidence… 

She could lift her hand right now and leave him aching, could still her actions and draw desperate calligraphy from lips that usually stayed quiet and calm. It was positively enthralling, and though she would tuck that particular temptation away for another date, it validated every ounce of want that she’d held for him up to this point.

It was simpler than she’d thought, to bring him to this point. Her forearm was beginning to ache a bit but it was laughable compared to the way he finally relented to it all and buried his forehead against her neck, his breath leaving him in hitched gasps that matched the rapid pace of his hips thrusting into her touch. She cradled him against her body until she could hear his breath stick in his throat, startled when he abruptly reached down and cupped a hand around the head of his erection, stilling her grip around his pulsating shaft with the other as he came. The warmth of the thick ropes that shot out over both of their fists surprised her, but not quite as much as the way his voice had shifted, quivering in an ecstatic groan against her body while he trembled and jerked against the climax ripping through him.

A few seconds ticked by in the aftermath before Tora rolled to his back with a huff, his chest heaving with the effort to slow his breathing. Poppy braced herself on her elbow, her hand suspended in the air so as not to coat the blanket that was still draped across their bodies. She wasn’t quite sure what was supposed to happen now; had never really entertained the thought this far for fear that she’d burst from bashfulness, but it became a moot point as an enormous arm scooped her up from behind and pressed her against a broad chest that still fluttered with a pounding heartbeat. She let a giggle escape and adjusted slightly, pleased to find that his other hand, too, was poised awkwardly away from anything they’d risk laying on that evening. 

“If that’s your price for a sleepover,” he finally said in between breaths, “I’d love to see what ya’d do for a date.”

“Pervert.” The word had no heat in it, and the chuckle that rewarded her insult was nearly as gratifying as what she’d just witnessed. She allowed herself to be pulled closer for a moment as Tora pressed one more kiss to her forehead, undeterred by the light sheen of sweat that now coated the both of them. 

“C’mon, let’s go rinse this shit off before you hog all the blankets up.” He helped her to sit up before kicking the comforter off, toeing the other leg of his sweatpants from his leg as she moved to stand.

“I do  _ not  _ hog the blankets--”

“Nah, that’s a fuckin’ lie.” 

“You’ve never even slept next to me!”

He waved her off as he padded over to the bathroom, hiding his smile from her while she continued to rattle off her defenses behind him. Realistically, he knew they could simply wash their hands and be done with it, but as he cut the shower on and tested the water, his mind was already rampant with various schemes to get his hands back on her. He had no intentions of pushing her further than she wanted him to, but he doubted she’d stop him from washing her back for her, just the same… Satisfied with the temperature, he turned, amused to find her deliberately training her gaze on his face in a hard stare, her cheeks ablaze in a brilliant spray of crimson. 

Flashing his dimples to her, he pulled her close to him with his clean hand and raised an eyebrow, surprised to find her more squeamish about his nudity than she’d been while she was jerking him off five minutes ago. Keeping his movements slow and predictable, he ducked his head until he could whisper to her, knowing it would disarm her just enough to ease whatever anxieties she still harbored. “Now, ya gonna join me? I don’t bite, ya know.”

Her body startled at the reminder of her earlier taunt before she rolled her eyes, shaking her head at his persistence. “Fine, but you better not misbehave.” 

For a moment, his smirk was electric. 

“Wouldn’t dream of it, sweetheart.”


	6. Reunion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Write a fluffy followup to the events that occurred in chapter 39.
> 
> Obviously, minor spoilers are present for 39. If you don't fast pass and would prefer to avoid that sort of thing, consider this your warning. <3

Fireflies had always been, in Poppy’s mind, the first real sign of summer.

As she sat upon the stone wall outside of her grandmother’s cottage, she watched the little insects with a soft smile on her face as they danced in the darkness over the garden in front of her. Her father had always told her that they were the stars that had fallen from the sky, wishes that hadn’t been fulfilled just yet. As she’d grown, she had come to recognize that they were obviously just bugs, but the warmth that spread in her heart each year when they finally made their grand appearance was still genuine and whimsical. It was nearly enough to calm the brewing ache of anxiety that sat low in her belly, and despite the peaceful atmosphere, her leg began to bounce in an attempt to quell it.

She had already planned on coming home around this time; it was a difficult time of year for their family and twice so after her father had passed, leaving them with a shattering anniversary that lingered on their calendars like an ominous deadline. She hadn’t wanted her grandmother to spend it alone, and thankfully Gil had been more than understanding when she’d requested the extra day off to make the trip. It was the first time she’d returned since she’d caught Julri in the act of severing their relationship once and for all, and while she’d anticipated the feelings it would bring back to the forefront of her mind, it didn’t make it any easier of a pill to swallow.

What she  _ hadn’t  _ expected, however, was to hear from the other man she’d met that same day, who had changed her life as quickly as he’d left it.

A cup of tea sat next to her, cooling rapidly in the chilly mountain air. She pulled her phone from her pocket and navigated to their text chain for probably the hundredth time that evening. It had been long enough since she’d last heard from the mysterious stranger who had all but stolen her heart before breaking it neatly in two, the memory of his sad smile and awkward laughter in her ear still as clear as the day he’d wrapped his arms around her on that overhang. Her heart pounded in her chest underneath the ring that hung faithfully around her neck, the only token she had left of him from their brief affair. He’d been serious when he had told her it was goodbye--despite the few times she had reached out to him afterward, he had never answered her again.

Of course, Erdene and Jacob had told her that she was crazy for clinging on to the items. They’d been empathetic at first, but as the weeks had turned into months with no indication that Tora would be coming back into her life, their empathy had turned to exasperation, their comforting words morphing into comments and invitations that urged her to move on, to find someone else… Despite knowing that they were probably right, each time she considered pursuing somebody new, it still felt as though she were betraying the wild tiger with his awkward jokes and soft heart, and so she simply brushed them off, choosing instead to focus that energy on the newer challenge of editing the torrid works of Q. B. Noyouko, bestselling author and professional drama queen.

Her screen was painfully bright and forced her eyes into a squint as she read:

_ hey sweetheart _

That’s the best you can do after three months?

_ need a huge favor _

Oh, a favor. I love those.

_ someones hurt and we need em out of the city _

_ name your price _

It was here that she had paused for a few minutes, torn between concern and irritation. Tora had never actually asked her for anything more than some flirting and a hot meal, and for him to reach out to her, specifically, for something like this was an immediate alarm bell that still rang through her thoughts even now. The fact that he had immediately followed up with an open offer without any sort of lewd joke or humor attached had sealed the deal that it wasn’t just a friendly check-in.

I’m at my granny’s place in Moonbrite. I’ll text you the address.

Over an hour had passed since she’d sent him the information, with no response or clarification. She hadn’t been  _ entirely  _ forthcoming with her grandmother, just enough to let her know that her friends needed her help, but she wasn’t nearly as worried about that as she was over what was about to show up at their door. Narin City was easily a two hour drive by any  _ normal  _ capacity, but she’d seen firsthand how Tora chose to drive on a good day. Add some sort of emergency onto that, and she suspected that he’d be much earlier than any average visitor.

She finally took a sip of her tea and set her phone down, trying not to fret. She was no stranger to injuries, certainly--growing up in a farming village and weathering years of boxing lessons had taught her a great deal about mending a wide array of wounds in some creative ways. Tora hadn’t said  _ how  _ hurt this person was, but the urgency of his messages led her to believe that it was probably something more than a sprained ankle or some scraped up knees. She’d prepared the old first aid kit as best she could and changed the linens in the spare room, grateful for a simple, specific task with which she could busy her hands. There was only so much time she could spend on tidying bandages and fluffing pillows, however, and so now she simply sat outside and waited with a lump in her throat.

At the very least, she mused, she’d be able to  _ hear  _ him coming before she could spot him. For all the man’s stealth and paranoia, his car boasted a deep growl even when it idled, and memories of squealing with laughter in the passenger seat as he pushed it to its limits on the winding back roads brought a smile to her face even over her anxiety. Truth be told, even though they’d shared a scant few days together, Tora had set some seriously high standards for how men should behave--particularly in comparison to Julri--and Poppy had ultimately come to accept that even if she  _ did  _ want to move on to another partner, it would likely be a very long time before anybody came close to the comically white loafers they’d need to fill.

With a deep sigh, she finally slid off of the stone wall and cradled her tea between her hands, wondering for a moment if she should put some snacks together. It was a cheap grab at a distraction, she knew, but even so, she supposed it wasn’t likely to go to waste once everything had settled down. As she turned toward the door and began to mentally run through the contents of the pantry, she heard the distinct roar of Tora’s car as it echoed off of the mountainside and froze, her anxiety abruptly spiking into full-blown panic. Snacks forgotten, she dashed to the door and poked her head in, calling out in a voice she could barely hold steady. “Granny, they’re here--you don’t need to get up, I’ll handle it--I’ll introduce you in a little bit, okay?”

She waited for a response, halfway convinced that her grandmother would likely be entirely unable to avoid involving herself just the same, and felt her heartbeat quicken as Tora’s tires hit the slag in the driveway behind her in a slide. There was no time to judge his predictably terrible parking as she turned, her tea sloshing over the rim of her mug, just in time to see Tora and his passenger leap out of the car, rip open the back doors, and begin hoisting a third individual from its confines.

The sight of him turned her tongue to cotton.

Whoever this poor soul was had obviously been attacked, and viciously. It was nearly impossible in the low light to discern where the blood stopped and the dirt began, and as Tora scooped the man’s torso up in his arms and waited for his passenger to grab his legs, Poppy could feel her hands begin to tremble and she clamped down on herself, knowing now was certainly not the time to lose it. She had just enough time to pull the storm door open and brace her foot against it before the three men arrived in front of her, declining to even glance up from their task as she directed them. “Th-the guest room is the first door on the right in the hallway, you can put him in there--”

And just like that, they’d passed by her in a rush, leaving her only with the scent of blood and cologne lingering in the air behind them.

Shaking it off and rushing in after them, she plucked the first aid kit off the counter and paused, grabbing the kettle from the stove as an afterthought. The water inside was still hot from the tea she’d made earlier, and as she rushed in after them, she was immediately grateful for it--the man they’d dragged inside was infinitely worse up close than he’d been at the end of the driveway, and if she weren’t so determined to hold up her end of the bargain, she probably would have simply fainted outright.

Whoever Tora had brought with him was now standing there bickering with him, much to his extreme irritation as the stoic bodyguard began to make quick work of their impromptu patient’s clothing. The blood rushing in her ears prevented her from hearing  _ exactly  _ what he was saying, but it seemed as though only one of them--the one currently cutting a bloody sweatshirt in two--felt any sort of genuine desire to save the man that was groaning in agony beneath them. Sensing a brewing argument, Poppy moved quickly to set the items in her hands down on the side table and clamped a firm hand down on the angry man’s shoulder. “Listen--”

He jumped beneath her touch and turned in a whirl, stopping short when he caught sight of her. “Pops?”

“Ronzo!?”

“ _ Oi-- _ ” 

They both turned and faced a furious Tora, who had a large hand pressed down over a still-bleeding wound on the man’s chest. Poppy flinched and returned her attention to the individual in front of her, who had inexplicably turned out to be her apartment complex’s security guard. “There’s a drawer full of tea towels beneath the coffee pot in the kitchen. I need you to go and grab me a bunch of them, okay? There are a bunch of mixing bowls stacked next to the fridge--grab me the biggest one of those too.”

“Y-yeah, sure, I can do that.” 

“Tora, how bad is it?”

“Fuck if I know,” he lifted his hand from the wound and they both stared at it for a moment, watching the slow ooze of crimson that moved like lava against the man’s chest, “got here as soon as we could. Can ya help him?”

“Yeah, I think I can.” Poppy opened the first aid kit beside her and began pulling out several packets of gauze as the towels arrived, clutched tightly in Ronzo’s fist. “Fill that bowl with hot water, please, and put the towels over here.” 

It was times like these she was grateful for her ability to compartmentalize things almost to a dangerous extent--now that the drama of their arrival had passed, it was much easier in a way to focus on the more serious task of treating the wounded man in front of her than it had been to simply wait on Tora to arrive. Just as she set to soaking the first cloth in the water and clearing the dried blood from the man’s chest, Tora barked over top of her head, making her jump. 

“Gyu.”

“Y-yeah, bro?”

“Not a fuckin' word.” His face was terrifyingly serious, and Poppy deliberately avoided him in favor of the man who was still writhing beneath her hands. The tension in the air was suffocating as she felt Tora’s weight shift against the mattress. “You breathe  _ one fuckin’ word  _ of this, and I promise you I’ll put you in the fuckin’ dirt. Ya understand?”

“Yeah dude. I got you. I won’t tell nobody. Swear.” Poppy could hear him swallow behind her and knew that there was something here greater than she was, grateful that she had an excuse to play dumb as the boys sorted out their agreement. “Thanks for helping us out, Poppy.”

“Mhm.” She threw the towel in the trash and reached for another, moving to the man’s face. 

“I gotta go make a call. Make sure he doesn’t die, sweetheart.”

She glanced up over her impromptu project, surprised to find that the terrifying aura that had rolled off of him moments ago was nearly entirely gone, now, replaced by a strange sort of concern she’d only seen on his face once before: the night he’d said goodbye to her.

“Why don’t you get some fresh air? I do my best work by myself, anyway.”

It was a lie, but one they both needed. She knew Tora would be glad for the excuse to go and compose himself, and she wanted anything  _ but  _ an audience to try and figure out how to plug the holes in the man that they’d left to her amateur talents. As he left the room, she sighed in relief, and began to work in earnest to clean the remaining blood and grime from the skin she was preparing to repair. Fortunately, the coating yielded easily beneath the soft cotton, and soon she found herself speaking to the other man as she assessed him.

“Geeze, you really did a number on yourself, didn’t you?” He had long black hair that still stuck to his face in several spots, sporting a wide blue streak to one side. As she swept it aside, she admired his youthful face despite the bruising and noticed that he, too, had eyelashes that made her squint with envy. Allowing herself a small, cynical huff, she sat back in her chair and shook her head as she replaced the rag yet again. “I swear, you men don’t even appreciate the features you’re blessed with. It’s a total waste. Do you even realize how pretty your eyelashes are?” 

“I do, yeah, actually, thanks--” he coughed brutally, wincing in agony for a moment before cracking an exhausted, sarcastic smile, “--for noticing.”

She jumped at the raspy voice, knocking her knee off of the end table. As pain rocketed up through her body, she clutched at it and bit down hard on her cheek, forgetting entirely about her charge for a moment while she lamented her aching leg. “ _ Barbara Streisand--banana shenanigans--” _

The low chuckle from the bed was entirely lost on her. “Come on, toots, tell me how you  _ really  _ feel.”

“-- _ fudge biscuit kitty whiskers son of a mother  _ trucker  _ that hurt--” _

“Naw, don’t sugar coat it, honey.” A few more wet coughs escaped before he settled back onto the pillow. “You can do better than that--”

“You  _ weren’t supposed to talk!”  _ Falsely motivated by the bright pain that had now dulled to a deep throb, she glared at the man still grinning playfully at her despite his extensive injuries. It wasn’t until the man raised both eyebrows, grin still firmly in place, that she sighed dramatically and composed herself with a light blush. “Sorry. You just...startled me.”

“Seems I’ve been having that effect on people lately.”

“Do you...have a name?”

“Rumplestiltskin.”

“...what?”

“Wait, no,” he wheezed for a moment and clutched at his midsection delicately, “call me  _ Lord  _ Rumplestiltskin. Has a nice ring to it--”

Poppy rubbed at the bridge of her nose, silently mouthing the words she so desperately wanted to say out loud. Just as she was pondering whether to ask Tora if it would be alright to stick her finger in the man’s stab wound to buy herself some silence, he spoke up again, much softer this time.

“Hey, I’m just fuckin’ with ya. Name’s Goliath. I’d shake ya hand, but…” He lifted his spare hand up from the mattress to reveal two severely broken fingers, making the both of them wince.

“I’ll try to take good care of you, Rumplestiltskin,” she smiled at the name as she dipped her cloth back into the warm water, “so just try to take it easy, okay?”

“Hey, I’m not about to turn down a hot nurse,” he barely flinched as Poppy dabbed at the rapidly-swelling bulge on his forehead, instead distracting himself by eying her ample chest as she leaned over his body, “think I could tempt ya into a sponge bath, too, chickadee?”

“How ‘bout ya stop hitting on my girl before I finish what ya boss started.”

The deep voice startled them both and Poppy turned to find Tora leaning comfortably against the door frame, glowering at Goliath. 

“Aye aye, cap’n.” He settled once more after rendering a sloppy salute, his eyes closed and his breathing steady despite the obvious pain in his ribs.

Poppy wrung the cloth in her hand for a moment, feeling somewhat uneasy in the sudden tension and wondering just how much purchase Tora really held over the man to instantly shut him down with a simple threat like that. As she worked, he remained steadfastly behind her for quite some time, looming like a raven over her shoulder. The superficial wounds cleaned up easily, and the deeper ones had thankfully not turned out to be life-threatening, though she’d struggled a bit to remember the sutures her father had taught her when she was younger. The feeling of the needle passing through his skin had violently turned her gut; she’d managed alright with the livestock all those years ago, but somehow doing it on a  _ real person  _ made it so much worse. Fortunately, Goliath’s eyes had remained shut for the entire ordeal and her back was still facing Tora, so neither of them were treated to the pleasure of witnessing the various shades of green that had passed across her face as she’d forced herself to finish up strong.

At the very least, she mused, he apparently had a high pain tolerance, or he’d simply passed out otherwise--even as she stitched the few stab wounds she could find, he’d scarcely flinched. She wasn’t sure if she found it comforting or horrifying, and so she simply chose to focus on activating the few ice packs she’d stocked back when her grandmother had begun living on her own, pressing them against the more severe bruises that still spread like terrible watercolors across his flesh. Not even the extensive tattoos that covered his body could hide the evidence of how badly he’d been beaten; her heart ached for him, whoever he was.

When she finally stood and stretched the cramp from her lower back, Tora was gone, and so was Ronzo. A brief, horrifying vision of the both of them being trapped by her grandmother was enough to motivate her out of the room and toward the kitchen, where the lanky security guard sat behind a plate of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. Poppy glanced to the side where her grandmother was just setting up three mugs of tea, suspicious of the silence. “Granny?”

“Hello, dearest, I was just setting the boys up with some snacks.” Her hand trembled as she poured a generous helping of steaming water into each mug, but she paid it little mind, stubborn as ever. “It’s been a long time since I had such handsome young men in the house to feed!”

Her eyes traveled back to one of said men who was seated at the table, his mouth full of sandwich. He shrugged his shoulders and tossed his head toward the door. Poppy’s eyes flicked toward the porch, then back to her grandmother, who was just setting a portion of sandwiches and two mugs of tea onto a dinner tray. 

“I must say I can see why you like that one so much,” she quipped as she turned and handed the tray to her granddaughter. “Why, if I were his age--”

“Granny--”

“--I’d climb him like a tree!” Gyu choked back a laugh, much to Poppy’s growing embarrassment. Her grandmother continued, oblivious. “Now, you go out there and get your man, Poppy. I’ll be in bed  _ the whole night _ \--”

“ _ Granny! _ ”

Gyu attempted to stifle his laughter behind a fist and ended up opting for the glass of milk he’d been served with his late night dinner, spurring Poppy further into a furious blush. She swiped the tray from the table and stormed out, tossing a contrite glare at them both before she left.

Tora was seated outside in silence, his back to her. She paused, suddenly hesitant now that she was faced with confronting him. It had been months since they’d last spoken, and not by  _ her  _ choice, so was it really even appropriate for her to approach him? Should she just drop the food and leave…? Her feet shifted beneath her as she considered it. She was happy to see him, regardless, and she supposed that she should be thankful at least just to see his face once more, but their last interaction had felt so... _ final _ . Would she be pushing her luck, trying to speak with him? 

Swallowing the last bit of her courage, she padded up to the man and gently set the tray down next to him. She turned to leave, figuring that it would be better to allow him to come to her in the end, but a hand on her arm stopped her dead in her tracks. Her eyes traveled down to where Tora had reached out and ensnared her, as gently as he ever had, and followed the arm with her gaze until they settled on his face. He was still turned away from her, his face pensive, but it was enough to inspire her to concede to the silent request. Without pulling her arm away, she nudged the tray over until she could swing a leg over the wall, then sat down next to him.

The similarity, in that moment, to the last time they’d sat together like this… It settled over her heart like a cinder block, and she blinked rapidly to clear the tears that already gathered in her eyes.

Silence reigned between them for a few moments longer before Poppy sighed, her hands fidgeting in her lap. “I did what I could, but he should probably still see a doctor.” The word spurred the memory of the first time she’d shown up at Quincey’s condo with someone broken and bleeding, just as Tora had done that night, and the doctor they’d had on call. If Tora had gone out of his way to bring his friend two hours outside of the city, she sincerely doubted he was about to turn him around and take him right back to Narin General. “There’s a local physician here who would probably be able to fit him in tomorrow, if he gets any worse. Should probably at least get him some antibiotics?”

“It’s his own dumb ass fault. Shoulda just left ‘im there.” He slid his hand down so that it was now holding hers, though his gaze never shifted away from where the fireflies still sparkled like glitter across the field. 

“You’re related, aren’t you?”

That got his attention. The frown he pointed at her was anything but warm, and it was her turn to look away from him.

“You...both have the same face, Tora.” Even bruised and bleeding as Goliath had been, the resemblance was unmistakable. “Though apparently only  _ one  _ of you inherited any manners.”

He snorted. “I’ll let ya get away with a lot of things, Bobby, but that one’s taking it too far.” His thumb stroked the back of her knuckles, betraying his tone. “Can’t exactly explain it to ya, anyway.”

“Yeah, I figured you were gonna say that.” She shifted until she could hold his hand between both of hers, tracing the veins and tendons that stood out below his knuckles. “Guess a mafia hitman’s gotta protect his secrets.”

She felt him startle, his forearm tensing to steel. 

“Just the same, he’s welcome to stay here for a few days while he recovers a bit. Granny’s glad for the company, anyway.” She continued to trace his fingers as if she hadn’t just dropped a bomb on him, careful to keep her face the very picture of innocence. “She’s kind of inappropriate sometimes though, so--”

The look he turned on her was fierce and penetrating, slicing the end of her sentence off like a knife. 

Poppy sighed and gathered her thoughts for a moment; she’d known he wasn’t going to just let that slide, but she was still putting all of the pieces together, herself. She’d gone over this conversation in her head about a million times already, and  _ none  _ of the scenarios she’d concocted ended with a particularly friendly resolution. “About a month after we--after we said goodbye, the police contacted me and asked if I would mind coming in for an interview. I figured it was about the magazines we’ve been putting out at work lately, but…” She took a deep, steadying breath, trying to remain calm as she began to relive the anxiety that had overwhelmed her when she’d shown up. She could still feel the chill of the steel table beneath her arms even two months later, and shivered, suddenly wishing she hadn’t brought it up at all.

“Turns out, the interview was about you. Inspector Lane was the one who’d connected me to you after she had seen me wearing your hoodie, and wanted to ask me some questions about how I knew you.” She risked a glance at the man, but the only indication that he was even listening to her was the tightness of his jaw that had clenched to near-painful levels. She winced. “The dossier they had on you was...pretty extensive.”

“I bet it fuckin’ was.” A heavy silence followed his words.

Not to be outdone now that she finally had some momentum, Poppy grinned softly and bumped Tora with her shoulder in a playful nudge. “Come on, lighten up. I thought the orange bowl cut really brought out your eyes--”

He cut her off with a disgusted grunt, inspiring her to collapse in a fit of giggles. 

“In all seriousness, though, they were pretty aggressive until they realized that I wasn’t going to sell you out to them. I tried explaining that there really wasn’t even anything to tell them, unless they were interested in learning about your severe dislike of junk food or your expensive taste in shoes.” For a moment, her shoulders sagged, her humor evaporating. “I wanted to tell you about it, but at that point you had...made it pretty clear that you didn’t want to hear from me anymore. I didn’t really know what else to do, so I just kind of...moved on from it.”

After a moment, Tora sighed, taking his hand back from her and resting it against his thigh. “If ya know all that stuff about me now, it should make sense that I didn’t want ya getting involved.”

“I guess so.” They both watched the fireflies for a few minutes, unsure of what to say. Poppy broke the silence first, fearing that the longer she waited, the more time it would give Tora to come up with another goodbye. “I’m sorry it took your friend getting hurt to happen, but… I’m really glad you’re here, Tora.”

“I’m a fuckin’ criminal, sweetheart.” He shifted and stood, keeping his back to her. “Be better off if you forgot you knew me, and now ya know why.”

"Can you just stop for one second and look at me?"

He paused at the tremble in her voice, but didn't turn to look at her. Not yet.

She continued anyway: "Yes, you have a terrifying job. And yes, you're exactly right that I probably  _ should _ stay away from you." She stood from the wall and reached out for him, wrapping her arms around his body in a tight hug. Ignoring the way he tensed beneath her grip, she held him as she pressed her forehead into his shoulder blades. "But Tora, I… I've thought about you  _ every single day _ since you took me on that picnic, and if staying away from you is what it takes to keep me safe--" she hiccupped, trying, and failing, to suppress the tears that poured forth, "--then I think I’d rather choose the danger, if it means you won't leave me again."

The seconds that followed her confession dragged as if an eternity. She held onto him with a death grip, quietly sobbing into his back as he stood there and turned her words over in his mind. His face revealed little evidence of the hot stone that sat deep within him after listening to the undiluted sorrow in her voice; if he'd felt guilty before, this had utterly shattered him. Finally turning within her arms, he placed his hands on the outsides of her arms, disappointed to find that her skin was cold beneath his palms. "'s that how ya really feel?"

Tears glittered on her cheeks in the old, murky haze of the porch light as she looked up at him, her lips and throat working in desperate tandem to keep from openly crying again. "Tora, you're so much more than your job. I told you that the first night we went out, and I'm telling you again." Her bottom lip began to tremble in earnest and she bit down on it, holding him as if he were going to vanish into thin air the second she relented. "Just… please, I promise I'll do whatever you say I have to do. I swear. Even if it means finding out what grilles are for my balcony--" Her eyes drooped away from his face as her confidence deteriorated with each word, wondering if she was fighting a lost battle after all when his expression failed to change. "Just give me the chance to show you what I see, and not what you  _ think  _ I should see _. _ "

Tora considered her for a long moment as she stood there in his arms, making a valiant effort to suppress the sobs that stuck hard in her throat. Her eyes glistened with tears that seemed never-ending, reflecting the vast spread of stars that decorated the sky above them, untainted by the city’s persistent light pollution and smog canopy. He had put those tears there--again--and the sight of it gutted him more severely than any target he’d dropped in his life. Before he addressed what she’d said to him, the impossible request that he’d never allowed himself to hope for, he reached up and slipped his fingers around the worn leather string that peeked out over her collar. It slid from beneath her shirt easily and boasted a simple steel ring as its only pendant.

“You kept it.”

Her laugh was abrupt and broken, a few more tears slipping from her eyelashes as she looked down at the makeshift necklace. “Of course I kept it. Your hoodie was too big to keep wearing.”

It was the first time that evening that the corner of his mouth rose, just a fraction, in the ghost of a smile. Instead of addressing  _ that  _ particular loss, he grabbed hold of her hand instead and pressed her palm to the outside of his pocket, making sure she could feel the lump of the little good luck charm that sat within. He watched her patiently as she frowned in confusion and traced the outline of it with her fingertips, transforming from deep sorrow to shocking clarity as she realized what he was trying to show her.

“Y-you kept my ponytail holder?”

“‘Course I kept it. Braids were too uncomfortable to keep wearing.”

She laughed outright, then, inspiring his smile to deepen just a touch. It was impossible for him to resist reaching up and brushing the tears from her cheeks in response, letting his hand linger there for a moment to cradle her face against his palm. “Not exactly a lifestyle that lets me make promises, sweetheart,” he shifted until he could pull her close to his body, pressing her to his chest as he spoke to her, “and there’s a lot I won’t be able to talk to ya about. Could be settin’ ya up for heartbreak just by bein’ here to begin with--”

“Tora,” her voice was muffled against his hoodie, “my heart was broken while you were gone to begin with. I think I’d rather take my chances here, and that’s not a decision you get to make for me. Not anymore, anyway.” She turned her head so that she could press her ear to his chest, taking comfort in the heartbeat that thumped rhythmically for her as she spoke. “ _ Especially  _ not after Rumplestiltskin in there had the audacity to ask me for a sponge bath while I was sewing him back together.”

There was a snort from above her head. 

“And we still didn’t discuss what you owe me for this nonsense, either, mister.”

“Told ya to name your price, sweetheart.”

She paused to consider the offer, somewhat distracted by the heat and the strength of his arms still wrapped around her body. “How about… I get to make fun of your orange hair, without limit, for a month.” She reached up to twirl one of his hoodie strings around her finger, deliberately hiding her devilish grin. “And you have to call me your girl again, like you did in the guest room.”

“Without limit? Forget it. One comment limit daily. Or I get to make fun of ya huge hamster balls again.”

“Two comments, and I’ll look the other way on whatever animal you decide I am that day.”

“Deal.”

“Fine.”

They both paused for half a second, then collapsed into peels of laughter together at the absurdity of it all. Eventually, their giggles sobered into smiles, and when Poppy tugged on Tora’s hoodie strings to pull him into a hesitant kiss, he responded immediately. It was the only thing he’d longed for each night that he’d deliberately avoided her, watching her from the shadows and longing to reach out, unwaveringly dedicated to keeping her safe no matter the distance he had to maintain. The relief that rippled through his body at finally having her in his arms again, not as a stranger this time, but with her acceptance--it was as if he were drowning, smothered under the weightless comfort of the one person in the world he no longer had to hide from.

He lifted her into his arms, ignoring the squeal that slipped from her as her feet dangled and her flip flops tumbled to the ground. Each time that their lips pressed together, it was as if it erased another week he’d spent away from her in emotional agony, until they were picking right back up where they’d left off…

...that is, until a rock hit him squarely in the back of his head.

“Hey, fuckhead, ya gonna stand there makin’ out all night or what? Granny’s makin’ dinner. It’s fuckin pot pie, dude. Like, a real one--”

Tora barely moved for a few seconds, allowing his lips to brush against Poppy’s as he spoke to her in a low whisper. “Gotta put ya down real quick, sweetheart. Duty calls.” 

“O-okay. Sure.”

No sooner had her feet touched the ground than Tora was off like a shot, tearing after Goliath in the doorway with a frightening speed she’d never had suspected the man could accomplish. Even after they’d disappeared, the scream that erupted from the other man had her laughing once again, and doubly so once Goliath and Ronzo both were thrown unceremoniously outside. The indignant squawking from the security guard--“The hell did  _ I  _ do?!”--was matched only by the mostly-real groans of pain let slip from the other tattooed thug, and as Poppy took the three of them in, she felt her chest tighten with affection.

“Tora, stop--you’re going to open up his stitches!” 

“Yeah you’re gonna open up my stitches, assho--ow,  _ shit-- _ ” 

Poppy covered her mouth as the largest of the three scruffed the younger man by his ponytail and dragged him back inside, leaving her to stare at Ronzo in amused disbelief. 

Having recovered quickly from the upset, he flashed her a boyish smile and a shrug, then opened the door to hold it for her. As she passed by, he rubbed the back of his head in his usual sheepish way and spoke so that only she could hear him.

“Welcome to the clan, Pops. Sorry ‘bout the initiation… tends to be a little different for everyone.” 

Casting a sideways glance to the two men now seated and bickering at the kitchen table, much to her grandmother’s delight, Poppy grinned and shook her head. “How many of you are there?”

“Mm, couple hundred, maybe. You’d need to ask Tora about who’s safe and who ain’t. I’m pretty new, myself.”

They both watched for a moment as Goliath attempted to stab Tora under the table with a fork, which was swiftly met with another near-broken finger. Undeterred, the man attempted again at his calf until the both of them were threatened with a wooden spoon and a firm glare to wash up and settle down. Both men were so surprised by the abrupt maternal discipline that they were too ashamed to do anything else, but when her Grandmother turned back to the oven, Poppy watched as Goliath attempted to wet-willy Tora, who promptly shut the operation down by cuffing him right on the side of the neck. 

As the shorter of the two collapsed against the sink, his grin still in place despite the obvious pain he felt, Poppy covered her mouth in shock. It wasn’t until Gyu leaned in conspiratorially and whispered to her the relation between the two that it all finally clicked into place.

Finally unable to keep the smile from spreading to her face, she shook her head and released a rueful sigh. Taking one last moment to herself as chaos continued to unfold in front of her, she closed her eyes and opened her heart for a moment, her thoughts clearer than they’d been in months:

_ I always did want a big family, dad. Can you see them now? I know it’s probably not who you had in mind, but Tora will take good care of me. _

She opened her eyes just in time to see the three gentlemen sullenly glaring at each other over a full, bubbling pot pie, her grandmother’s Cheshire grin the only indicator of just how close to bedlam the entire household sat. Planting her hands on her hips, she suppressed a giggle.

_...watch over him, too, would you? I think...I think we’re gonna need all the help we can get. _


	7. Caught

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: A and B (optional: and several others) are playing a party/drinking game (Ring of Fire, Spin the Bottle, etc.). 
> 
> This is a two-parter and encompasses chapters 7 and 8 of this series, respectively. Part two will be NSFW.

“A drinking game?” Poppy glanced up from her phone, tuning back into the conversation now that it had piqued her interest. It wasn’t that she minded the rowdy band of misfits that Tora had brought along, but there was only so much a girl could take. Even now as they sat in one of the private rooms of the club, the music muted and the lights much more accommodating, she couldn’t help but notice the light creep of headache behind her eyes from all the commotion of the evening. Regardless, this was an area in which she was  _ much  _ more experienced, and she wasn’t about to turn down the opportunity to show off for once. “Count me in,” she grinned mischievously, taking in the surprise that bled across the faces that surrounded her.

“You, little mouse?” the baby faced thug in the hat stared her down, his words slurring already. “You don’t seem like the--” he hiccuped, “--the type.” He started laughing and the rest of them followed, though whether they were laughing with him or  _ at  _ him, Poppy couldn’t quite tell. She’d been diligent to learn their names as best she could, but she was a few drinks in at this point, herself, and so her mind had defaulted to the old unfortunate habit of nicknaming them until she could confirm that she’d learned them correctly. As she peered at their faces, she watched with mild amusement as they flushed with equal parts intoxication and merriment, delighted at their own stupid jokes.

This would be a piece of cake.

“Ya don’t have to do this, sweetheart,” Tora murmured at her side, serious as ever. For being the ringleader, as far as she could tell, he sure got himself roped into a lot of situations he seemed to despise. Quincey was further off to his right and was the worst off of the group, stabbing at his phone in a stupor and giggling occasionally, failing miserably at hiding the nude photos one of his various paramours were sending him this time. The newest member to join them, Gyu, was at her left, and while she didn’t know him well yet, he was arguably the kindest of them all. Poppy was secretly grateful to have made a fast friend who didn’t frequently reference a crime-related skillset.

“It’s fine, I hold my liquor better than you do, anyway, remember?” She kept her voice low to match his, mostly because she had embarrassed the both of them enough for one night.

“Seriously?” His tone sparked a smug laugh that she immediately tried--and failed--to suppress.

“Okay, okay, let me get the--HEY!--let me get the bottle--HEY! ASSHOLE--”

Poppy jumped. The one Tora called Pinky was waving frantically out the door of their room, his voice loud and sharp until it was swallowed entirely by the persistent thumping bass of the club. She watched curiously as he interacted with the bartender for a moment and sent him off, wondering if this was what normal looked like for this crew. It was fascinating and exhausting and exotic all at the same time, and she found herself watching them all as she might watch a documentary rather than hanging out with friends.

Her attention snapped back to the group when the first man smacked his hands down onto the lavish coffee table in front of them and grinned, an uncomfortable glint in his eye. “So, what’ll it be? Poker? Ring of Fire?” He reached down to his boot and revealed a glimmering knife that he tossed playfully into the air before catching it by the blade, offering it to the group with a flourish. “Five finger fillet?”

Poppy swallowed hard and leaned in toward Tora, who was rolling his eyes.

“Uh, heh, maybe we should opt for something a little more… Ya know,  _ lighthearted _ \--” Gyu took the knife from the other thug and tossed his head in Poppy’s direction, his eyes saying more than his mouth needed to. 

“Aw, come on, if she’s gonna hang out with Big Bro Tora, she gotta earn her--”

“HEY!” 

Attention snapped to Damien, who slammed two tall bottles of vodka down onto the table. “I got a fuckin’ idea--”

“ _ There’s  _ a surprise. Hey everyone, Pinky has somethin’ to say--”

“Hey  _ fuck you _ , buddy, I got a lot to offer this world!” 

“Shut the fuck up, Damien, all you ever talk about is ya damn star chart--”

Poppy cleared her throat. “I...have a suggestion?”

The eyes on her were piercing for a moment, but softened to curiosity and excitement. It was a transition she was rapidly becoming used to, and the concept of it nearly broke her heart. They were all like sheltered dogs, she mused, desperate for attention but terrified of so many hands that caused them all harm. She did her best to offer a flattering smile and reached out for the collection of shot glasses that teetered dangerously in Damien’s hands, hoping it would help. “We could play Never Have I Ever?”

“Whassat?” Another nameless thug, handsome, sporting a $30 haircut and neatly groomed eyebrows. Poppy had been calling him Karen all evening because of the way his hair was flipped over his eye. She was certain that was not his name, but unfortunately, she had a knack for naming people things that...stuck.

“It’s a game where you try to make other people drink by calling them out for things  _ they’ve  _ done, but you haven’t.” The silence that surrounded her was almost eerie, compared to the constant noise that had bombarded her since she’d arrived that evening. She had their full attention, and the relief she felt nearly superseded the excitement that bubbled within her. She’d played this game often with Danae and Mirabelle and typically had a significant upper hand with them.

And compared to  _ these  _ guys… Poppy suppressed a telling grin and passed out the shot glasses as she continued.

“You usually start off by holding up five fingers,” she held up a hand to demonstrate, “and when somebody says something that you’ve done, you put one finger down and take a shot.” 

A dismissive noise swept from the mouth of the last of Tora’s group present: Brian. “Sounds fuckin’ lame. I’m in.”

“Yeah, cause you ain’t done shit--”

“Bro, I’ve done more shit than you would even believe--”

“Boys!” Poppy laughed, feeling Tora tense beside her in response to the mounting tension. Playing it off casually, she lowered her hand and gently laid it over his fist, turning to Gyu. “Gyu, right? Would you mind pouring us some shots?”

“Aw, don’t make  _ him  _ do it, he’ll actually pour the right amounts.” Damien waved off the offending part-time bartender and instead opened one of the bottles of vodka, swaying dangerously before he poured each of them a shot. Poppy watched, nonplussed, as the amount of vodka that met the table was nearly the same as the quantities in the glasses. 

“Th-thanks, um, Pin--I mean, Damien.”

As his name left her mouth, a deep blush spread across his cheeks, bringing a giggle out of her. She wondered what his street name was.

She hoped it wasn’t Pinky.

“Okay, I’ll start, so you guys know how it works.” She held up her opposite hand, noting with mild satisfaction that Tora had since relaxed and was now gently cradling her fingers within his own. Before she spoke again, she elbowed him lightly, earning herself another patented eye roll before he reluctantly held his opposite hand up to match hers. “Okay, are you all ready? Never have I ever...gotten a tattoo!”

There was a collective groan from the group that ripped a peel of laughter from Poppy’s throat. She watched with delight as each man present took his shot and grimaced, then grinned as Gyu snatched the bottle from the table to refill their glasses. “I know, I know, that was a cheap shot, but a girl has to play to win… Tora, you go next!” 

“No.”

“Ugh, fine. Gyu,  _ you  _ go next. Make sure it’s something grouchy here has done, okay?”

“You can’t form an alliance with my own guys, Bobby.”

“If you’re not cheating, you’re not trying.”

“What the f--”

“Okay! Um, let’s see here,” Gyu cut in, a bead of sweat forming on his brow as he watched Tora glaring at his date. “The trick is to try for something everyone else has done, right? But not me?”

“Yep, you’ve got it!”

“Okay, well, never have I ever… Uh, done drugs before?”

“Christ, we’re gonna lose this game before it’s even our turn.” Poppy watched as Brian, Tora, Pinky, Baby Face and Karen all downed a finger, followed by their shots. 

“Alright, boys, we gotta strat--start--sta… Um.” Damien squinted and smacked his lips, stumbling over the word. “We gotta get our shit together. Obviously little miss thing here has the advantage on us, so we gotta target her.” 

“Yeah!” Baby Face grinned victoriously and pointed at Poppy while Gyu refilled their glasses yet again. “Alright, how’s  _ this  _ one: Never have I ever--um,” he paused, whispered conspiratorially to Karen for a moment, came to an unheard agreement, then returned to pointing at Poppy with twice the enthusiasm as before. “Never have I ever had sex! Wait, shit--”

Another collective groan from the crowd and several fingers down.

“You’re supposed to pick things you  _ haven’t  _ done, dumbass, though what you do in bed can hardly be qualified as sex--”

“Shut the hell up, I’m a fuckin’ stud--”

“Yeah, that’s what your mom said to me last night, too!” 

Poppy watched as the excitement in the room escalated yet again and leaned in close to Tora. “Is… are they always like this?”

He answered her with a deep sigh, looking on as Damien and Baby Face began to play fight. “Oi.”

The two men froze mid-punch and glanced over at Tora.

“Get on with it.”

Damien made a show of staring hard at Poppy, which would have been intimidating if not for the deep, alcoholic flush that still painted his cheeks the same color as his hair. “Okay… How about… Never have I ever broken a bone?”

Poppy’s fingers remained steadfast as the other participants lowered another with a flat look. She giggled. At this point, they were all at least three shots in, back-to-back, and she was crushing it. She wondered for a moment how Tora would be holding up once they finally hit him, but that was a later problem she’d be willing to address. Right now, she had a game to win. “Brian, you’re up next.”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m thinkin’. Shit, this is hard.” He hiccuped and planted his chin in the palm of his hand, his eyes glazed and his eyeliner starting to smear. “Never have I ever--”  _ hic  _ “fuckin’  _ murdered _ somebody.” 

Poppy blinked in shock, then blinked again when several fingers went down. A cold chill traveled down her spine as she saw Tora’s finger drop as well. 

“Now you’re just sabotaging the game because you  _ want  _ to drink.” Damien’s voice was dangerously close to a whine until he noticed that Quincey had long since fallen asleep on Tora’s opposite shoulder, leaving the brooding, dark man up next. His face split with an eager grin. A glance around the room showed Poppy that the game would likely end soon, depending on what Tora had to offer. Several of them only had one finger remaining against her four, and she wondered if it would be weird to take a shot out of turn just for the fun of it. Still, she eyed Tora cautiously, unnerved by the strange smile on his face.

“Never have I ever…” his voice was a low, smooth drawl that dripped with confidence like honey from the comb, “...hired a mafia member to stalk a harmless old man so I could guilt trip him into a major investment by using memories of his late wife against him.”

The silence that fell upon them was heavy as they all stared, Poppy in scandalized horror and the rest of the crew in saturated confusion. It wasn’t until Gyu’s snort of laughter broke the tension that Poppy reluctantly dropped a finger, sending the entire crowd into a raucous cheer.

“Public enemy number one over here, fellas,” Damien’s laughter was warm and teasing as he elbowed Brian, who was drunkenly giggling over his next shot. 

Baby Face whistled low and put his hands up in mock defense. “Wouldn’t wanna cross paths with  _ that  _ one,” he gave her a wink, “a harmless old man, Pops? Really? What’s he got that ya need that badly? A golfing timeshare?”

More laughter as Poppy knocked her shot back and covered her face with her free hand, bashful but failing to keep her own giggles at bay. As Gyu refilled her shot glass, she shot a suffering look at the man to her right, who was still watching her with an odd smirk. “Cheater.”

“If you ain’t cheatin’, you ain’t tryin’ sweetheart.”

“Don’t use my own tactics against me, jerk!” She bumped him playfully, finding it more and more difficult to notice how beautifully  _ solid _ he was now that she’d gotten up close and personal with him. Shaking it off, she decided to fire back, preparing a beautiful closer when Erdene burst in the door. Before she could get a word in edgewise, however, Damien seized the unexpected opportunity. 

"Hey! Hey, babe. Give us a good one for the game. You know Pops pretty well, right?"

Erdene cocked her head in confusion. "Game?"

"What the hell was it called?"

"Never have I ever-"

"Yeah, that. So help us out, will ya? Ya friend is a tough nut to crack and we're desperate here."

Poppy shot a pleading look toward her friend, whose gaze was floating between her face and the rest of the miscreants who were waiting with eager anticipation. She felt her very brief glimmer of hope snuffed with a vengeance as a telling smirk spilled across the other girl's mouth. "Never have I ever played hooky from work to read porn novels in bed."

"Oh my god-"

The excitement in the air was positively electrified as everyone stared hard at Poppy, perched on the ends of their seats and nearly stock-still with suspense. Poppy could feel her cheeks blazing as she lowered another finger, setting the crowd into an unstoppable frenzy of teasing and banter. Underneath the din, Poppy buried her face into Tora's shoulder, wondering how her perfect plan had backfired so quickly. While Erdene attempted to cut into the drama to fish out her date for the evening, Poppy felt Tora's hand tighten around her own.

"...'s that why ya weren't there on Friday?"

The slur in his words prompted her to look up, surprised to find him openly grinning at her. "What?"

"All tucked up in ya bed readin' ya smut, leaving Quince and I to fend for ourselves?"

Her curiosity swiftly shifted to embarrassment that was tinted with indignant irritation. "Even if it  _ was _ ," she bit down on the word twice as hard, trying desperately to conceal the fact that he was exactly right, "it's not exactly something your friends should know about me!"

He chuckled, low and raspy, and pulled her in close. It was unlike him, this public show of affection, and as she caught a whiff of the alcohol on his breath, she couldn't help but feel a touch concerned about how far gone he was truly getting. Perhaps she'd pushed a bit too far, after all. As he whispered in her ear, his voice still louder than usual but smothered by the antics of the crowd that was still chattering amongst themselves, his lips were warm and soft against her temple. "What do ya say we blow this joint? About to turn into a shit show anyway if we let these guys go much longer."

"O-okay, yeah, sure, but how are we getting home?"

"I got it covered, sweetheart. Just lemme find my fuckin' keys-"

"Nooooope, no sir," she reached out and hastily stopped him from reaching toward his jacket pocket, already snagging her phone with her free hand. "You are  _ way _ too drunk to drive, and so am I. I'm just gonna call a cab."

She expected the attitude from him and was already ready with her retort when he grimaced at her in protest. 

"Don't worry, he's a friend of mine. I trust him." At least, she figured he was the least likely option to try to rob them blind. “Just follow me, okay? Try to stay upright. You’re heavy.”

“Yeah, yeah, ‘n’ I got a big head, got it.” His tone was nearly pouty at this point, which told Poppy that she had a scant few minutes before she’d  _ really  _ need her “friend” to help her out. She fired off a quick text message and prayed that he was not only working, but also paying attention to his phone, and started to lead Tora from the club as best she could. The rest of the crew was suitably distracted by Erdene trying to do the same with Damien at this point, and it was the most Poppy could do to shoot an apologetic glance over her shoulder before Tora slumped onto her in an awkward hump. 

Poppy was grateful that the alcohol in her system seemed to artificially bolster her as the large man she’d come to know as a stoic pillar of steadfast intimidation began to twirl her hair between his fingers, entirely unhelpful as she dragged him along the stone floors up and out of the cave entrance. His feet caught underneath him frequently enough that Poppy wished desperately that she could just carry him somehow, but his height alone prevented that if his attitude didn’t, and she found herself huffing out an irritated sigh as he began to nuzzle at her neck, peppering her with sloppy, alcohol-scented kisses.

“Tora--”

The grunt from beneath her jaw was sleepy and distracted.

“Tora, come on. Honestly, it was only a handful of shots--stop that--we need to get in the cab, it’s pulling up now. You have to tell him where you live!”

“Don’t want a stranger knowin’ where I live.” 

“I don’t remember your address--seriously, stop, you’re gonna make a scene--if you’re not gonna tell him, you’re going to have to come back to my place.”

“...’s fine…”

“You hate it there.” Poppy eyed the cab battling the evening traffic toward them as Tora’s fingers trailed up her back, fiddling with her bra clasp through her dress. She considered smacking him, but wondered what the repercussions of slapping a drunk mafia...person were. Shifting away from his hand and shooting him the meanest glare she could come up with as the vodka settled neatly into her blood, she waved at the cabby when he drew nearer and sighed in relief.  _ That’s one step down, now to get you home… Honestly, you weren’t kidding at all when you said you couldn’t drink! _

As the cab driver stepped out of the driver’s seat and tossed her a small wave, his eyes widened significantly and his hand froze in mid-air when he caught sight of Tora. Poppy blinked at him and then attempted a glance at her date for the evening, who had encircled her protectively and was glaring at the driver with overwhelming suspicion. The way he was holding onto her pinned her arms at her sides, quashing her attempts to elbow him indignantly, and so the most she could do was to simply roll her eyes in exasperation and offer a contrite smile. “Sorry, I promise he isn’t always like this.”

“You... _ know  _ him?” 

“Yeah, this is Tora. Remember? The guy from the business card?”

“Jiminy Christmas, no  _ wonder  _ you told me to call him. I bet he could crush my skull with one hand!”

“Wanna fuckin’ find out?”

“Tora!” Poppy pulled an arm free and planted it against Tora’s chest, trying with all her might to pry him off of her. “Let’s just get home, alright? You’re lucky he’s willing to help us at all with the way you’re scowling like that!” Finally managing to detach herself, she stepped into the cab through the door the driver was nervously holding open for the both of them, but not so quickly that she failed to notice he was very firmly keeping the door between himself and the glowering young man trailing after her. The thought brought an awkward grin to her face.  _ Oh, that wouldn’t stop him, friend. Sorry he’s being so rude. _

____

It had been a relatively uneventful ride home. Tora had reluctantly supplied his address after being reminded of how quickly he could break into his date’s apartment and then spent the first several minutes getting his hands swatted while he tried to make not-so-subtle passes at Poppy, who did the best she could to make awkward small talk about the game footage that Jacob had sent the driver. After being denied several times, Tora had sat back with a huff and ultimately fallen into a drunken twilight, slumping over until his head rested awkwardly on Poppy’s shoulder. She’d held his jacket in her lap, grateful for something to fiddle with that wasn’t his hands.

Getting into his apartment was another thing entirely, as the number of stairs they’d needed to climb directly contrasted with Tora’s ability to work his gross motor skills after several shots of alcohol had taken over his system entirely. By the time they’d made it to the door they were both panting, sweaty, and out of sorts, leaving Poppy wishing desperately for a shower and a long, deep sleep, and Tora nearly unconscious once again. As she turned and locked the door behind them, she heard his body hit the couch with a muted thud, and let out a long sigh of relief.

“Tora?” She tapped him on the back somewhat cautiously, then shoved him with enthusiasm after receiving no response. He was out cold. A sarcastic twist reared inside of her as she rolled her eyes and left him, hanging his jacket neatly on the hook that jutted out from the wall and then setting off for the shower. It felt odd, helping herself to his apartment when she’d only been there once before, but her feet were killing her and he was certainly going to be of no help, and so she muttered to herself as she made quick work of her shoes--“ _...girl’s gotta do what she’s gotta do, Pops…”-- _ and made for the bathroom. 

Her shower was quick and awkward, equipped with only a large bottle of all-in-one soap and a threadbare towel hanging on the wall, but she’d be lying to herself if she didn’t admit that it cleared her head and warmed her up a great deal. Thankfully, Tora had a dresser full of clothes in his bedroom from which she fished out a pair of sweatpants and a baggy shirt before she crawled into the surprisingly large bed in the same room. She’d expected cheap linens and a musty, undisturbed smell from what Quincey had told her of the other man’s sleeping habits, but as she sank into the mattress and pulled the covers to her chin, she found the bed to be shockingly well-maintained.

_ Why on earth would he launder bed clothes that he doesn’t bother to use? _ She pressed the comforter to her nose and inhaled deeply, smiling faintly at the smells that combined into what could only be described as uniquely Tora: soap, fresh air, and cigarettes. They were obviously not slept-in, from the smell of them, but nevertheless she found herself grateful for the lucky break as she closed her eyes and settled in. Her thoughts were still racing, and even as she attempted to calm herself down now that they were away from the mayhem and safely tucked away, she couldn’t help but focus on the one part of the evening she was certain she would never forget:

That kiss.

A deep blush spread across her cheeks in the dark.

Julri had  _ never  _ kissed her like that. The feeling of Tora’s hands cupping her jaw fluttered back to her, followed immediately by the growl in his voice and the way his brows furrowed just right as he scolded her for her candid flirtation… The memory of it sent a shiver through her body. Tora was a force of nature in all things he did, and his attempts to seduce her were no different. The heat of his palm against her side as he’d pulled her in close to taste her left a signature of fire through her, and although she didn’t entirely regret pushing him away, she had to admit that the more she indulged him, the further she wanted to go.

Despite herself, Poppy let her hands travel along her body, incomparable to his, but still retracing the same routes she found herself wishing she could feel from him. She wasn’t sure if the knowledge that he was just down the hall from her was terrifying or exciting, and the secrecy of thinking such things about him while lying in  _ his  _ bed forced her hands even lower than she’d intended to let them go. It was impossible to deny herself just a little indulgence, just a touch, after she’d tasted him again and felt the electricity that hardened his muscles when she’d kissed him back just as passionately. 

And yet…

Her hands paused at the waistband of his pants. And yet, it  _ would  _ be rather rude of her to take advantage of his unusual hospitality, right? Even though the scent of him filled her mind and the memory of his near-silent moan as their tongues first met thrilled her, even though she could still hear him cursing under his breath, telling her she tasted like  _ heaven _ … She sighed, gathering the sheets in her fists. She was positively throbbing for the man, and it was going to be a very long night if she didn’t do something about it. 

Peering at the doorway through the dark, she eyed the space where she’d left the door cracked in case Tora needed anything. While she pressed her legs together and nibbled indelicately at her bottom lip, it felt as though the room stared back at her.


	8. Caught, pt. 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: A and B (optional: and several others) are playing a party/drinking game (Ring of Fire, Spin the Bottle, etc.). 
> 
> This is part 2 and is NSFW. Simply a bonus and can stand alone.

Tora groaned.

It was late. He picked his head up off of the couch cushion and turned his head, savoring the relief he felt as his neck finally turned the opposite way than he’d been lying. His head was threatening a nasty headache and his shoes were still on, and as he fought to focus his vision through the fading haze of intoxication, he realized he was home. 

He blinked lazily for a few moments, letting his thoughts catch up to him.

He could remember playing that stupid fucking drinking game--and losing, miserably, he grimaced--and then the other broad showed up to babysit Pinky… His eyes felt like sandpaper as he continued to blink, open, close, open, close. Bobby grabbed him and ushered him out of the club? And then they caught a cab… and it was at that point that things sort of disappeared. He bared his teeth in a hiss and felt around the floor for his pack of cigarettes, his irritation mounting further when he discovered that they were nowhere in reach. He propped himself up for a moment and squinted through the blackness that blanketed him until his eyes settled upon his jacket hanging on the wall.

_ The fuck? I never hang that there. _ He pulled his legs underneath himself and sat in a lump for a moment, scratching at his scalp and scowling.  _ Who even knows I live here? Quince was too fuckin’ drunk to repeat his own name, and Bobby-- _

He startled. Where had she ended up? He cursed himself for letting himself go for an evening, already peeling himself off the couch to fish out his phone and call her. What time even was it? Would she be awake to answer? He stood, wobbly at first and desperate for a glass of water, before his body reminded him what  _ else  _ tended to happen when you drank. Taking just a moment longer to sit and remove his shoes that were still tied firmly to his feet, he grumbled to himself that it was definitely the last time he did anything like  _ that.  _ Shuddering with both relief and urgency once his feet were comfortably released, he turned toward the bathroom, conceding that wherever Poppy was at this point, it wouldn’t much matter if he at least took a leak and grabbed a drink before he found her.

He hadn’t lived in this apartment for terribly long, but it suited his needs well enough, he supposed. It would be another few months before he moved again, and if nothing else, he at least knew the place well enough to navigate it with his eyes shut at this point. He’d never made much of a habit of turning on the lights as he moved around, preferring instead to remain as concealed as he could for most things, and so he slinked down the hallway to relieve himself while still half asleep, placated by being in his own space and away from the club. After satisfying one need, it was moments later that he padded into the kitchen and snagged two bottles of water from the case on the fridge. He downed one before he even left the room.

His feet were silent against the hallway floor as he meandered back toward the couch until a soft, foreign noise met his ears and stopped him dead in his tracks. Almost unsure that he’d heard it, he braced a hand against the wall and strained, listening hard through the underlying soundtrack of the city around his building, and nearly jumped when he heard it again: 

“Ahhh--! Oh, Tora…” 

He stared into the expansive darkness of his apartment, digging deep for an explanation that would suit the feminine, warbling moan that had just exited his bedroom. The only one he could come up with was nearly impossible to believe, because  _ surely  _ that couldn’t possibly be…? He tiptoed closer to the door, creeping along the wall. Had he been an onlooker, he might have considered this completely ridiculous, lurking around his own apartment like a peeping tom, but the possibility--and the impossibility--of it all was too great to resist, and so as he paused outside of his bedroom and steadied himself with a deep breath, he vowed that this, too, would be the last time for this experience.

His hand pushed the door open with crucial slowness, his mind torn between discovering just who was moaning in his bed without him and thanking whatever gods he could come up with that he paid attention to maintaining his living space well enough to eliminate creaks and squeaks...and then he saw her. His eyes had adjusted to the darkness well enough that her features were easily discernible even in the windowless room: Poppylan Wilkes. In his bed.

_ Touching herself. _

He nearly leapt backward from the doorway and instead carefully concealed himself behind the door, his senses acutely dialed in to her hastened breathing and hollow, rushed moans that she was obviously trying to suppress. In a matter of moments, he felt his loins swell in response, and his options quickly dwindled to three.

One, he mused as he reached into his pants to adjust himself, he could stand here like a fuckin’ pervert while she finished herself off, then find some space to address himself away from her. As she choked out another soft, breathy cry, he squeezed his growing erection and nearly groaned, himself, reluctant to let go now that he’d started something he shouldn’t have.

Two, he could leave right the fuck now and let her have her privacy, which is what he  _ should _ do, and  _ would  _ do, if it didn’t feel so fucking good to work himself to the symphony of her moaning his name. 

Or three, he counted in his head as he leaned against the door jamb… Three, he could interrupt her and finish her off  _ for  _ her. Certainly the most dangerous option, considering that he’d already been turned down by her once this evening, but she was literally in there calling out for him, so what the hell was he supposed to do? Ignore her? He nearly laughed. He wanted her more than almost anything else in this life, and she was right  _ there _ , telling him inadvertently that she wanted him, too… He clenched his jaw and stroked himself a moment longer, willing her to keep going, desperate to hear her cry out for him again.

It wasn’t until  _ he  _ let out a long, low groan, himself, that everything came to a screeching, terrifying halt.

He froze awkwardly, his hand still gripped tightly around his shaft, pants undone and body taut as he desperately prayed that he hadn’t been heard, but as the silence swelled into a deafening roar, he felt his gut tighten with dread and panic. His heart was pounding in his chest and his thoughts were on overdrive-- _ shit shit shit play it off quick you dickhead you better unfuck this situation fast _ \--when the smallest, shyest voice called out to him from the bedroom: “...Tora?”

He slid his hands from his pants at long last and covered his face with both palms. “Yeah, sweetheart.”

“Are you okay?”

He blinked, mulling the question over for a moment. It wasn’t what he’d expected to hear after practically shouting to her that he was rubbing one out to the sounds of her enjoying herself. “Am I...okay?”

“That groan sounded...painful.” He had no time before the bedroom door sung silently open to reveal Poppy standing there sheepishly, twisting the hem of his t-shirt in her fingers. She was braless, and the worn cotton of the outfit she’d chosen for herself hung perfectly against her nipples that still stood proudly erect from her earlier activities, nearly forcing him into a faint from the sight of her. He pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes to try and erase it before he caused yet another problem for himself, but Poppy was on a mission at this point as she reached up to grab his wrists in cool, steady hands, pulling his mask away so that she could peer up at his face. “You had a lot to drink tonight. Is it a headache?”

It was a golden excuse. All he needed to do was play it off like he was hungover (even though he was pretty sure he was actually still a little drunk), leave her to her business, and go back to the couch where he could suffer in silence...and yet, as he looked down at her beautiful face, he frowned. He knew  _ damned well _ that sound was not a groan of pain, and he knew her well enough by now to know she wasn’t stupid enough to believe that, either. She was giving him an out, an act of mercy from her endless supply of kindness that she always offered him even when he least deserved it, and the thought of lying to her in response to that made his chest constrict with disgust. 

Sometimes, he mused, you simply had to own your own fuckups. 

Releasing a long, deep sigh to brace himself, he reached up and ran a thumb along her cheekbone, trying to smile for her. Smiles felt strange on his face, but she liked them, and as she leaned into his touch and closed her eyes, he fought the urge to pull her in close to him. Not when he’d nearly violated her, and certainly not while his pants were still undone between them. “No. Not a headache.”

“I know it isn’t really your style, but… Maybe you’d be more comfortable… in here? With me?”

Her eyes had opened and she was watching him carefully, a glint of something he couldn’t quite put his finger on running beneath the surface. She was still pretending on his behalf, allowing him alibis that he didn’t deserve. “No offense, but your couch kind of sucks.”

“Ouch, my feelings.” He allowed her to take him by the hand and pull him into the bedroom, and with each step he took, his heartbeat quickened until his chest was nearly bouncing with the force of his own adrenaline. Never in his life would he have guessed that his old ratty t-shirt and sweatpants would have made such excellent lingerie, but what the thin cloth revealed was as enticing as what it hid from him, and by the time he made it far enough to sit on the mattress, he found himself longing for an excuse not to, lest his erection give him away as much as his voice did. At least the room was ensconced in darkness. Thank God for small mercies.

Poppy brushed his bangs away from his forehead and smiled softly, admiring the bedhead that sent the black locks into a wayward sprawl across his head. “I hope it’s alright that I helped myself to your apartment,” she murmured softly to him, tugging the small elastic from his hair and smoothing her fingers through the kinks it left behind. Her fingertips felt like a cool summer rain against his scalp, and despite the raging hard-on he was still desperately trying to conceal from her, he found himself enjoying the unfamiliar sensation. Everything she did was so new, so gentle and unlike anything he’d grown used to in all his brutal years of training for the clan. 

“Sweetheart, ya keep doing that and you can move the fuck in for all I care.” 

Her giggle was musical and sly as she pulled his head forward to brace his forehead against her chest, forcing him to rapidly acknowledge the swell of her ample breasts that now sat prominently beneath his chin. She was working her fingertips against the back of his head now, just above his neck, targeting the tension there with a persistent, dappling massage. “I hope I didn’t wake you up. I had such a great night with you, I guess I couldn’t fall asleep.” 

“Still kissing ass, huh?” 

“Well, kissing was  _ part  _ of it…” Her fingers slowed and Tora could feel her body shift, prompting him to lift his head to look at her straight-on. Even in the darkness surrounding them, he could see the deep blush that covered most of her face. “Even though I stopped you, I kind of… wish… I hadn’t.” Her voice trailed off into nothing and her body began to tremble. 

Tora reached forward and braced his hands against her hips, steadying her and keeping his face carefully neutral despite the hurricane of emotions that raged within him. First she was bold and hitting on him, then she was pushing him away when he indulged her… Then she was getting him drunk and taking him home, but leaving him on the couch… Then she was getting off in his bed and saying she wanted him after all? It was enough to give him a real headache to match the notional one they were still dancing around. Treading lightly but growing weary of the way they continued to avoid the real issue at hand, he did the best he could to keep his tone gentle. “That why you were moaning my name in here?”

It shot through her like a bullet and he could feel the immediate tension beneath his palms as he continued to brace her, both out of fear that she would simply bolt, and out of a general unwillingness to let her go. He chuckled at her anxiety and shook his head. “Ya don’t have to be scared of me, sweetheart. Shit, you busted me, too. Makes us even, doesn’t it?”

Poppy was nearly gnawing on her bottom lip, her cheeks dark and her fingers continuing to worry the hem of the shirt she’d stolen. “You… You weren’t nursing a headache, were you?”

“‘Fraid not, kitten. And I know you weren’t in here trying to sleep.” He reached up at long last and pulled her lip from between her teeth, instead pulling her in so he could meet her mouth with his own in a chaste kiss. 

“Is that...weird?” Her lips were damp and swollen when they brushed against his as she spoke in a hushed whisper. 

“Only if you think it is.” Tora let his hands trail lower, running them along her thighs and lamenting the sweatpants in his way. “Way I see it, we’re just prolonging the inevitable.”

“Wh-what do you mean?” 

“Look at us, sweetheart.” He brought his hands further up, sneaking beneath the t-shirt so he could feel the softness of her skin while he spoke. “I’m no fuckin’ expert, but it seems to me like there’s a lotta somethin’ between us.” He noticed that he’d sufficiently distracted her away from worrying holes in his shirt now that his hands were back on her body. Risking a glance at her face, he noted that her eyes had also slid shut at some point, allowing her to lose herself in the way he was touching her. “So why don’t we quit bullshitting ourselves and just let it happen?”

“B-but Tora, what if--” she shivered as he grazed along her spine with his fingertips, “--what if we finally do something and then you don’t--”

Her words cut abruptly, piquing his curiosity. “I don’t what?”

“You don’t--” she pushed against him and took a step back, wrapping her arms around her midsection protectively. “--want me anymore.”

Tora squinted at her. “Huh?”

“I--when you said earlier, at the club, that nothing meant anything between us… I--” she flinched, tightening her hold on herself. “I guess I felt bad because that was mostly my fault. I got so caught up in trying to live my own life the way I wanted to that I didn’t stop and see what was really happening.” 

“...what--”

“I do want it to mean something.” She took a deep, shaky breath and sighed it back out, turning away from him as she continued to hug herself. “I do. I don’t want whatever this is to be a meaningless interaction, and all of the time I’ve spent with you… Every time we’re together, I feel strong, and happy, and like I can be myself. I...didn’t get to feel like that, before. And I’m scared that if we take things to another level, it’s going to ruin everything. I’d rather have some of you than none of you at all.”

Tora flexed his fingers for a moment, unsure. The girl in front of him had gone from horny to emotionally volatile in less time than it had taken for him to lose a drinking game, and his head was still swimming with exhaustion on top of it. The conversation felt less like navigating their relationship and more like diffusing a bomb as the seconds ticked by. Opting not to make it worse as he usually did, he reached forward and pulled Poppy toward him until she was seated in his lap, then wrapped his arms around hers so that she was encircled by them both. “And...ya think if you finally give in to what you’re feeling, I’m gonna disappear on ya?”

“W-well.. What you said on Regina’s Peak…”

He paused on his way to press a kiss against her shoulder, surprised that she even remembered their conversation. He  _ had  _ told her that he was only trailing her for a job, and that he tended not to keep many close relationships. At the time, he’d been certain that the severance would have been clean, if not acutely painful for the both of them. When she’d shown back up at the restaurant with Quincey, however, that had all been neatly scrambled for them both, and he’d long since forgotten about his attempts to keep her at bay. Now that she knew what he was about and  _ still  _ wanted him coming around, he’d been so wholly distracted by finding excuses to keep it that way that he’d never stopped to recognize that she wasn’t the only one sending out mixed signals, here. “Hey. Listen.”

He tightened his arms around her a fraction and waited until he felt her relax further before he continued.

“If I was gonna bail on ya, sweetheart, I’d have been gone a long time ago.” The words felt strange coming from him, and he’d be lying if he didn’t admit that the concept of offering something of himself that was more than a one night stand still made him uneasy, but he hadn’t lied to her yet. He didn’t intend to start a habit of it now. “And if that kiss was any indication of what ya have to offer, I’m pretty fuckin’ sure I’m not about to leave if you decide you wanna jump me now.”

Despite the tension that had settled over them, Poppy let out a small giggle. “Jump you? That’s a little bold, isn’t it?”

“Well, ya fuckin’ tased me. Figured you go big or go home.” 

“You deserved it.” She shifted so that she could turn her head to look at him, a soft, calculating look on her face. “You promise?”

“That I’m not gonna run screaming if ya get horny in the middle of the night again?”

She sighed dramatically, rolling her eyes. “That you’re not gonna ghost me as soon as you get what you want from me.”

The notion disquieted him. She hadn’t said much about her ex, and it wasn’t as if he needed more of a reason to send the kid into an early grave, but… If this was where she apparently felt her value to him was, she was more damaged than he’d initially thought. He couldn’t fully say  _ what  _ he wanted from her, but even he was smart enough to recognize that it wasn’t simply a roll in the hay and a high five goodbye. “Afraid you’re stuck with me for the time being. Can’t promise I won’t have to disappear from time to time for work, but I’ll do the best I can to warn ya. ‘S as much as I can say.”

She mulled it over for a moment and the silence dragged out, though it wasn’t nearly as uncomfortable as it had been moments prior. After a while, she shifted in his arms so that she could throw her legs across his and meet his gaze. “Were… were you… outside the door earlier--”

“Yep.”

“...because of me?”

“Yeah.”

She reached up and hooked a finger into the collar of his shirt, tugging at it playfully as she fought the bashfulness that threatened to consume her. “Would you...show me?”

He snorted. “All of that  _ and  _ a show?” Her squeal of shock and laughter rang out sharply in the darkness as he swung her around to pin her to the mattress beneath them. “Sounds to me like ya gettin’ greedy now. Why don’t you show me yours and  _ then  _ I’ll show ya mine?”

Poppy gasped, presenting a valiant effort to appear scandalized despite the giggles that still bubbled from her. The emotional drama had left them almost entirely now, leaving both of them feeling as though they’d just fought a battle together and emerged unexpectedly victorious. She swatted playfully at his chest, scolding him. “Excuse you. After dragging you home and putting you to bed, I think it’s the least of which I’ve earned.” 

He made an overly obvious show of considering her offer, and then responded by shaking his head in mock disappointment. “Nah. Gonna have to insist on this one, sweetheart. Or did you forget that you’re in  _ my  _ bed,” he placed a fingertip at her knee and began to draw it slowly along the curves of her body, “wearing  _ my  _ clothes,” he traced up and over the outside of her breast through the shirt, finally coming to rest underneath her chin so that he could tilt her gaze to meet his, “in  _ my  _ apartment?”

“N-no…” his eyes were intense and piercing as he looked down at her, pinning her to the spot. She wanted to be annoyed that he could regain the upper hand so easily, but the way that he was looking at her was a carbon copy from her earlier fantasies. Between the memories of the way his mouth felt pressed against hers and the lingering scent of his cologne taunting her body to respond, it was all she could do to suppress the shudder that desperately wanted to rip through her in response. “I… I guess I could… it’s pretty dark in here after all.”

“That’s my girl. Show me what you were doing earlier .” He shifted his hand until he could cup her jaw in his palm, then kissed her deeply, his pace unhurried. He knew by now that she could almost certainly feel the evidence of his interest pressed against her abdomen while he held her close to him in the darkness, and he wondered for a moment if perhaps it was too much. Their tongues slid against each other for a long moment until he leaned back from her to press his forehead against hers in a gentle bunt. “I won’t touch ya until ya tell me to, if it makes you feel any better.”

“O-okay, yeah, that works.” She chewed at her bottom lip for a moment and he half expected her to pull away again before he felt her hand begin to travel further down between their bodies. He cradled her in the dark, his eyes shut and heart pounding, as her hand trailed lower and lower until her knuckles against his belly indicated that she was dipping beneath the waistband of his sweatpants that still sat neatly around her waist. He held his breath, his chin propped gently against the top of her head, and waited for the long, slow, shuddering sigh that slipped from her lips and brushed across his collarbones like a warm breeze.

In that moment, he had two wishes: One, that he’d had the forethought to tug his pants down to his thighs  _ before  _ he’d made promises he was rapidly becoming unable to keep, and two… As Poppy’s back arched and she pressed her chest against his, her breath catching in her throat as she teased herself between them, Tora wished deeply that he could simply die in that moment, because he’d already made it to heaven. 

He kept his hands firmly seated where they’d been placed earlier, painfully aware of how tightly he was holding her and vowing not to break the trust that she’d given him. He wanted desperately to flip them, to pull her up and onto his hips so that he could ravish her while she teased herself to thoughts of him, but he’d given her a vow that he wasn’t going to intrude, and she was making it deliciously challenging to uphold it. Afraid to lose control of himself, Tora kept his body tense, his senses torn between deliberately restraining himself and soaking in the feeling of her hand working herself between the two of them.

It was only a matter of time, he considered, before he either did something about himself or he’d ruin this entirely.

Making the executive decision so as not to lose his fucking mind, Tora tilted his head back and kissed the mewling girl next to him on the temple, halfway surprised when she punctuated it with a trembling kiss of her own. The way she sucked his bottom lip in between her teeth sent a jolt of pleasure and shock straight through his chest and into his groin and he grunted, unable to resist any further. Gasping as she tore away from him, he pulled her closer and murmured to her. “I’m gonna join ya now, sweetheart. Is that alright?”

Her nod was staccato, hasty and abbreviated as her attention was almost entirely devoted to herself. 

He reached down between them, then, past her hand that was rapid and rhythmic as her pleasure began to mount, and gripped himself tightly through his boxers. The moan that escaped him rivaled the one he’d let slip from the hallway, and after seeing the effect it had on Poppy, whose body outright writhed in response, he hooked his thumb into both his boxers and his jeans and yanked them down in a few awkward pulls until they gathered around his knees. Finally freed and aching for release, he returned his chin to the top of her head as he stroked himself, quickly working into a labored, sultry pant that matched hers almost directly.

It wasn’t long before Poppy paused and slid her hand from her pants, choosing instead to wrap the same fingers around Tora’s forearm. The feeling of slickness against his skin, knowing that it came from her, was nearly his undoing until he heard her voice cry out to him softly. “Tora.” 

It was agony to stop and deny himself yet again, but the tone of her voice was too close to fear for his comfort. Snapping out of it, he glanced down to peer at her through the darkness. “Yeah, sweetheart? What’s the matter?”

“Tora, I need you to--” she paused, still holding onto his arm as if she’d outright disappear if she let go. His heartbeat quickened in fear that he’d ruined whatever this was between them until he saw her look up at him, her eyes hooded and her lips swollen. “Please.”

The word was like a prayer from her, gentle and needy, and he would have killed a thousand times to fulfill her. “Please...what? What’s wrong--”

“I need you to touch me, Tora.”

He blinked, his hand finally stilling on his erection out of surprise. “Poppy--”

“Please.” She slid her hand down along his forearm until she gripped his hand, pulling it away from his own arousal and instead guiding it inside her waistband. As soon as his fingertips found their way to her, transitioning from soft, trimmed hair to folds that were swollen and soaked with need, his eyes rolled and his brows slammed together against the overwhelming sensation of  _ her _ . He bared his teeth against it and worked her for a moment, gently at first until she urged him further, then sunk two fingers inside of her and cupped the rest of her in the palm of his hand. The cry that wrenched itself from her throat nearly sent him over the edge on principle until she reached forward, herself, to wrap her slender, cool fingers around the head of his weeping manhood. 

His body jerked violently at the contact, sending Poppy into a whorl of concern. “S-sorry, I didn’t realize--”

She began to pull away from him when he hastily pulled his hand from her pants and clamped down over hers, keeping her from letting go of him. “Don’t stop, sweetheart.” He noticed that both of their hands were shaking and guided her into a rhythm, irritated that his need for her was driving him to act like a fumbling virgin all over again. “Do whatever ya want to me, just…  _ Christ _ , don’t fuckin’ stop.”

His hand returned to her and worked diligently, pulling a rapid climax from her that he rode relentlessly by dragging his fingers along her inner walls as she screamed for him. His hips had a mind of their own at this point, thrusting against her awkward attempts to get him off, uncaring that she was inexperienced and hypersensitive to the softness of her palm while she pumped him, trying in earnest to keep time to his rhythm even delirious with pleasure. When her body finally stilled, he pulled his hand away from her and instead braced himself against her shoulders, using the leverage to continue to drive himself into her fist over and over until at long last, he choked on the surge of ecstasy that overtook him, shooting thick, hot ropes of pleasure over her hand and onto the shirt she’d stolen from him hours earlier.

A gentle quietude settled over them as he attempted to catch his breath, his head swimming with the foggy remnants of his climax and making way for a genuine headache to take over in its wake. It wasn’t until Poppy shifted awkwardly beside him that he realized what needed addressed, and he was grateful that the dark room helped to conceal the amused grin that he was too lazy to stop from happening. “Just chuck it on the floor and get a new one.”

“Tora, that’s gross.”

“Unless ya plan on walkin’ to the fuckin’ laundromat at this hour, ‘s our best option.”

She let loose an exasperated sigh before she rolled away from him. He watched, keenly interested as she tugged the shirt up and over her head, revealing a pale, slender back. He’d only just begun to admire her before she shot a glare over her shoulder at him and clutched the shirt to her chest. “No peeking.”

“Seriously? We just--”

“No  _ peeking _ .”

He rolled his eyes and then covered them with his hand, feigning irritation. Her quirks didn’t actually bother him, not really, and he waited until he felt the weight of her body leave the bed before he slid two fingers open and peered at her shadow from between them. She cleaned her hands with the t-shirt and then partly folded it, then tossed it to lay next to the dresser. He nearly laughed. She then followed up by opening several drawers, feeling through the clothes until she found what she was looking for, glanced over her shoulder at him once more to make doubly certain he wasn’t doing exactly what he was doing, then donned a new t-shirt and returned to stand next to the bed. “Move over, we gotta pull the covers back.”

“For fucks’ sakes, sweetheart, just come here.”

“What do you--”

He reached out and grabbed her hand, tugging her down onto the bed. Pausing just long enough to pull his boxers up and his pants the rest of the way off, he chucked the offending garment in a high arc to land on top of the soiled shirt from earlier, then encompassed nearly her entire body as he wrapped his arms and legs around her. “I’m warm enough for the both of us, trust me.”

“You planned this whole thing out, didn’t you?”

He snorted, then blew a few strands of her hair away from his face. He wasn’t sure whether it was amusing or irritating when they floated directly back into place, sticking to his bottom lip. “Not exactly what I had in mind, but I’ll take it. Quit fidgeting.” 

She stretched, then settled into a boneless sprawl against his body, lying there long enough for him to fall into a comfortable, sleepy fog. He was nearly out before her voice piped up once more, small and cautious. “Tora?”

“Mmm.”

“Did...did you really mean it when you said you’d stick around?”

“Sure did, kitten.” He took a moment and cracked his neck, the tension in his body finally relieved enough for him to work the kink out from sleeping face-down on the couch earlier that evening. “Gotta work up to getting your pants  _ off  _ before I get in ‘em next time.”

The gasp that rang out was music to his ears, pulling a laugh from him even in the haze of exhaustion. 

“Bold of you to assume there will  _ be _ a next time.” Her tone was petulant, but he knew better than to believe it. Instead of taking the bait, he settled in further, drinking in the scent of her hair as he buried his nose against the back of her neck.

“Get some sleep, killer. If you behave I’ll treat ya to breakfast in the morning.”

“...breakfast?” She snuck a hand underneath his and laced their fingers together. “What are you going to make for breakfast?”

“Pork.” He punctuated the word with a gentle thrust against her backside, laughing outright when she threw an elbow into his side. Thankfully, it was the last word that needed to be said between them as she followed her indignant squeal with a deep sigh and pressed against him at long last, still holding his hand. He let his laughter trail off into a quiet chuckle, and then a soft smile, content to simply hold her in his arms as she slept.

_ Happy birthday us _ ,  _ sweetheart.  _ He squeezed her briefly.  _ Sorry I broke your shit and then gave you my dick as a present. I’ll do better next year. _

And what a wonderful gift, he thought to himself, to plan for next year.


End file.
